Salmon Salad
Mayonnaise dressing Ripe olives Remove the salmon from the can; wash in a colander under running water and drain. On each salad plate make a nest of lettuce leaves and in it bury a portion of the salmon, broken into small pieces and covered with Mayonnaise. Garnish with ripe olives.
A three-line composed salad from an era when canned salmon was a pantry staple rather than a convenience. Almost everything worth saying concerns the fish and the dressing, since the assembly is self-evident.
- Skip the washingRinsing canned salmon under running water strips away the packing liquid, which carries much of the salt and flavour. Drain it well in a sieve and press gently, but there is no need to rinse unless you find the brine aggressive.
- Bones and skinTraditional canned salmon includes the vertebrae and skin, both softened by retort processing. The bones are edible and a genuine source of calcium, but if the texture bothers you, lift them out with the skin as you flake the fish.
- Which salmonRed sockeye is firmer and darker and holds up to being broken into pieces; pink salmon is softer and cheaper and tends to shred. Tin sizes vary -- the small modern tin is about 6 oz, the traditional tall tin nearer 15 oz -- so check the label; about 6 oz drained serves one generously or two as part of a larger plate.
- Mayonnaise made with raw yolkPeriod mayonnaise means yolks, oil, vinegar or lemon, beaten by hand, and nothing here cooks it. Use pasteurized eggs or a good commercial mayonnaise if the salad is for children, the elderly, or anyone immune-compromised, and keep the assembled plates cold until served.
- Ripe olivesIn an American book of this date, "ripe olives" means the black, lye-cured, canned California olive, mild and soft, not a brine-cured Kalamata. The substitution changes the dish considerably: the California olive is a quiet garnish, the Greek one dominates.
- Seasoning the original omitsThe recipe assumes the mayonnaise carries all the acid and salt. A squeeze of lemon over the flaked fish, a grind of pepper, and a little finely minced celery or onion bring it much closer to what a modern palate expects.
- TemperatureChill the salmon, the lettuce and the plates. This is a cold salad whose only real fault is going tepid, at which point canned fish tastes markedly of the can.
- YieldAs written, one plate per person; figure roughly 6 oz of drained salmon for every one to two servings depending on whether it is a lunch course or part of a spread.
Canned salmon was the great industrial food of the Pacific Northwest, and the Columbia River canneries had been shipping tinned fish worldwide since the 1860s. By the time loose-leaf cookbooks like this one circulated, a tin of salmon was among the cheapest reliable proteins in an American kitchen, and cookbooks of the period are thick with ways to dress it up u2014 croquettes, loaves, creamed on toast, and salads like this one. The instruction to wash the fish may reflect a period concern about the taste and appearance of the packing liquid. The "ripe olive" garnish is equally of its moment: California's lye-cured black olive industry was young, heavily promoted, and its product turns up as a decorative flourish across many salads of the 1910s and 1920s.