Salmon Rice Porridge

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With Chinese New Year just around the corner, this is a wholesome dish to cook during the 15 days of celebration. This bowl of salmon rice porridge (三文鱼稀饭) – consisting of multigrain brown rice, assorted diced vegetables and omega-loaded salmon – will be a healthy change amidst all the feasting. If you have visitors streaming in at different times of the day, this recipe includes instruction to allow each bowl to be made-to-order and cooked on-the-spot.

See Also:

• Abalone Chicken Porridge Recipe
• How to Cook Porridge on the Stove Top
• Chinese New Year Recipes

For those feeling under the weather, this is a good dish for recuperation as this rice porridge is easy to digest and nutritious.

Step-by-Step Photos

In this recipe, I cooked the base multi-grain porridge and salmon soup stock separately. This way, the porridge stock is not diluted, and there is also an option not to make all the salmon rice porridge at once. It sounds like more work, but it isn’t really, because I used the rice cooker (more on that below) to make the base multi-grain porridge which takes away the bulk of the hard work.

Marinate Salmon

Remove the skin and bones of a salmon fillet, and slice thickly as shown above. The salmon is then marinated in mirin, ginger juice and soy sauce overnight in the fridge (if not overnight, one hour will be sufficient). I am overly sensitive to the fishy taste of cooked salmon, and this marinade removes any fishiness while retaining the sweetness of the fish.

Part 1: Cook vegetable multi-grain porridge in the rice cooker

I cooked the porridge in a rice cooker which comes with a ‘Porridge’ function. If you don’t have this type of rice cooker, you can cook it in a large pot over the stove for 30-40 minutes. Click here for step-by-step pictures for making porridge on the stove top.

In the rice cooker inner pot, add washed rice (brown + multigrain), onion, garlic, diced vegetables (carrot+daikon+celery) and sliced cabbage leaves.

Add water, dried or fresh sliced shiitake mushrooms and set to “Porridge” mode.

I make porridge in the rice cooker nowadays as there is no need to watch the stove. About an hour later, I am rewarded with a large pot of multi-grain vegetable porridge without any effort :) By the way, this vegetable multi-grain porridge tastes really deliciously wholesome on its own. You can switch off the rice cooker for now.

Part 2: Cooking salmon + making the quick soup stock

Now we need the stove with a soup pot (use an extra large one if you want make all the salmon porridge at one go). Bring dashi stock and ginger slices to a boil, then add salmon slices to cook for about 3 minutes.

If you want a better presentation, strain off the floating bits with a mesh strainer to get clear stock.

Turn the heat to very low. Dissolve miso paste (to taste) in the hot soup. This miso salmon soup stock is delicious with the sweetness of salmon.

Part 3: Put together the rice porridge

If you want to make all the porridge at a go, just ladle all the cooked porridge directly to the pot of salmon stock. Bring to a short simmer and serve.

But if you want to “made-to-order” salmon porridge at any time of the day, divide into three components (soup stock, multigrain porridge and cooked salmon) as shown above. Keep the stock and salmon in the fridge.

To make-to-order, just ladle the required amount of salmon, rice porridge and soup stock into a casserole (I am using a serving shared shallow claypot that serves 2-3 pax on the table). Warm through. Optional: Add an egg for extra deliciousness.

You can also break up the salmon into smaller chunks….

… and serve them in a smaller bowl. Enjoy!~