Oven Baked Salmon Cakes with Maple Teriyaki Sauce

These oven baked salmon cakes are easy to make, nutrient dense and packed full of flavour. Dairy and gluten free, with fresh herbs, rich squash and omega packed salmon all topped off with a maple sweetened teriyaki sauce.

Well, here we are, at the end of the first week of January. The solstice has come and gone, the holidays have ended and the new year was celebrated. We went to Whistler for the holidays, spent time with my family, ate everything in sight and then worked off said food snowshoeing for hours. I had packed books and seed catalogues in hopes of accomplishing some reading by the fire and garden planning… and absolutely none of that happened. Between family visits, fondue parties, trips to Ikea (yes, multiple trips to Ikea were made… and a kitchen may have been purchased!!!) and a traditional Japanese new year celebration, we hardly had time to sit still. And now that we are back home I’ve been installing lights and tackling projects to prepare for the kitchen installation (good thing Adrian enjoys assembling things from Ikea 😝).

In addition to the kitchen plan, I’ve started a garden plan. With a hot cup of coffee in hand I’ve been working my way through a stack of seed catalogues trying to decide what to grow. With more garden space than I’ve had in a while, I’m having a hard time not ordering every. single. variety. that piques my interest. Can you imagine, these salmon cakes made with home grown pumpkin and served with bok choi picked fresh from the garden… here’s hoping…

If you have leftover roasted pumpkin or yams just mash it up and use it instead of squash (I used some roasted and mashed red kuri squash for these). If you’re not into asian flavours take it in another direction – try adding sun-dried tomatoes, parsley and capers for a mediterranean twist. While the salmon cakes are baking, cook your rice, make the teriyaki sauce and steam some veggies!

Oven Baked Salmon Cakes with Maple Teriyaki Sauce

adapted from: Well Fed 

yields: about 15 cakes

Ingredients

• 3 – 150g cans Wild sustainably sourced salmon (I use wild pink salmon)
• 1 cup Cooked squash, mashed (canned pumpkin puree or mashed yams also work well)
• 2 large Eggs
• 1/2 cup Ground almonds (I pulse them in my food processor until fine and mealy)
• 1/4 cup Cilantro, roughly chopped
• 3 Green onions, thinly sliced
• 2 tsp. Ginger, grated
• 1 Shallot, minced
• 1 clove Garlic, minced
• 1 Tbsp. Sriracha
• 1 Tbsp. Oil (I used melted coconut oil)
• Maple teriyaki sauce (recipe below)

Pre-heat oven to 400°F.

Drain liquid from salmon, and mix all ingredients (except oil), in a large bowl – I like to use my hands to combine everything, crushing the salmon bones with my fingers as I go.

Place in fridge to firm up for 10 minutes.

Use a 1/4 measuring cup to portion out mixture and form into patties. Place on parchment lined baking tray. Brush with oil and bake for 20 minutes. Flip, brush with more oil and bake another 10 minutes.

 

Maple Teriyaki Sauce

yields: 1 cup

Ingredients

• 1/3 cup Tamari (gluten free if desired)
• 1/3 cup Maple syrup
• 3 Tbsp. Mirin
• 2 Tbsp. Sake (or white wine vinegar)
• 1/4 cup Cold water
• 2 tsp. Cornstarch (organic)

In a small pot combine tamari, maple syrup, mirin and sake. Bring to a boil, then reduce temperature and simmer for 10 minutes.

Stir cornstarch into cold water, then whisk into tamari mixture. Continue to simmer another 5 minutes.