Honey Glazed Salmon – A Couple Cooks

Impress everyone with this honey glazed salmon recipe! The easy flavorful sauce features honey, soy, miso and garlic.

Here’s a dinner idea that gives you maximum return on investment: this Honey Glazed Salmon recipe! In under 30 minutes, you’ve got tender, flaky salmon fillets that are bursting with flavor from a sticky glaze of honey, soy sauce, miso and garlic. That’s what we mean by return on investment: there’s little time needed to make this incredible dish that will have everyone licking their plates clean!

Ingredients in honey glazed salmon

This honey glaze for salmon can be made in just 5 minutes, making it the ideal quick sauce for weeknight meals. Mix up the 6-ingredient sauce in a bowl, then brush half of it onto the salmon. Broil it up, then pour the remaining glaze on before serving. It makes the best sticky sauce that coats everything in savory sweet flavor. Here’s what you’ll need for this recipe:

• Salmon fillets, wild caught if possible
• Olive oil
• Yellow or white miso
• Honey
• Soy sauce
• Rice wine
• Garlic powder
• Ground ginger
• Olive oil, for brushing

Types of miso

Miso is a Japanese fermented soybean paste that’s full of nutrients and savory flavor. It’s known for its intense savory flavor, otherwise known as umami: the fifth flavor. You can find miso in the international foods aisle near the Japanese ingredients. There are many different types of miso, and they all taste different. We recommend using white or yellow miso for this miso butter recipe: sometimes they’re labeled as “light miso”.

• White miso (Shiro miso): This variety has a mild, more delicate flavor and less salt than darker miso.
• Yellow miso: This type is fermented a little longer than white miso and has a mild, lightly sweet flavor.
• Red or dark miso: This variety is fermented longer than white or yellow miso. It has a very strong flavor and can overwhelm the flavors in a dish, so we don’t recommend using it here.

Tips for buying salmon

The most important thing when it comes to making this honey glaze salmon recipe is the quality of the fish. Lower quality salmon can taste very fishy and have a mushy texture. It can also have a lot of white stuff (called albumin) when it’s cooked: while it’s not harmful, it doesn’t look appetizing! Here’s what to know when shopping for salmon:

• 1 to 1 1/2-inch thick fillets are good for this recipe and look impressive; you might find it labeled center cut at the store.
• Look for wild caught salmon. Fish that is wild caught in your country is usually a sustainable choice. (There are also quality options in well-regulated farms; see Seafood Watch Consumer Guide.)
• Buy fresh salmon. Salmon that’s fresh from the fish counter usually has the best flavor. Frozen can work too, but try to find highest-quality frozen salmon. Avoid those big economy-sized bags, which we’ve found it typically thinner and can taste fishy.

How to cook honey glazed salmon

This honey glazed salmon recipe is broiled salmon, an efficient method that skips the oven preheating time and cooks the fish in just 10 minutes! You can also make this recipe oven baked or grilled (see below), but our favorite way is broiled because it’s so quick and it gets nicely crisp and browned on top. Oven baking can work, but the salmon comes out more moist and soft. Here are a few tips for this recipe:

• Allow the salmon to come to room temperature before cooking (brine it if possible!). This can take 15 to 20 minutes, but it’s important. If the salmon is too cold when heat is applied, the outside can cook much faster than the inside. We recommend brining the salmon, which is letting it sit in salt water while it comes to room temperature. This helps to season the fish and also avoids the white stuff (albumin) when the fish is cooked.
• Remember the thickness determines the cook time. 1-inch salmon takes 8 to 11 minutes to broil. Very thin salmon can broil in just 5 minutes, so adjust the cook time accordingly.
• Keep an eye on the broiler! Salmon can go from pink to brown very quickly in the broiler: so don’t stray too far away, especially at the end of the cook time.
• The salmon is done with the internal temperature is 125 to 130°F when measured in the thickest part. The fish will continue to cook after you remove it from the heat. To ensure full safety, the FDA recommended temperature for seafood is 145°F, or well done.

Other methods: baked and grilled

This honey glazed salmon recipe also works baked or grilled! Here’s how to do it:

• Baked: Follow the instructions in Easy Oven Baked Salmon, but follow the seasoning instructions in the recipe below. Brush on half the glaze before baking, then pour on the remaining half once it’s done.
• Grilled: Follow the instructions in Grilled Salmon, but follow the seasoning instructions in the recipe below. Brush on half the glaze before grilling and brush on half afterwards.

More salmon recipes

This honey glazed salmon recipe is one of our favorite salmon recipes to date! Here are a few more to try with this tasty fish: