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Healthy Cranberry Balsamic Salmon! This one skillet roasted balsamic salmon infused with maple syrup and cranberries is a simple 30-minute sweet and pungent dinner. Perfect for holiday and winter dinner menus!
My mother is always full of surprises. When she was here for my hip surgery, she confessed to me how she’s always wanted a motorcycle. Not just any motorcycle. A purple motorcycle. Oh boy! Dad, pretend you never heard this.
You can imagine my shock when I heard my conservative mother confessing this “wild” side to me. It was unexpected coming from the saint of a woman I know. But somehow I can see her riding that purple motorcycle in a stylish leather jacket and up to your knees boots.
After thinking about it, I realized this wasn’t too far off for her. Looking back, she’s always lived on the edge a bit. Like our holidays meals for instance. Instead of making the traditional turkey or ham she would make spaghetti or salmon.
Now I should preface this by saying she didn’t buy a box of spaghetti and call it a meal or grill salmon and slap on a platter. She always turned it into some extraordinary. This Skillet Cranberry Balsamic Salmon is extraordinary indeed.
You see the holidays are not defined by a certain food but rather, the traditions you make of them. You can have traditional holiday flavors regardless of what you make.
And sometimes stepping outside your comfortable menu bubble may pleasantly surprise you. This Skillet Cranberry Balsamic Salmon is certainly one worth going out on the limb for!
P.S. The salmon was delivered freezer cold right to my door from Sizzlefish! It’s not easy for me to find fish where I live and they deliver it pre-portioned which makes eating healthy so easy!
Perfect for delivering holiday flavors in a new way, or even an easy, comforting dinner. Made in less than 30-minutes, this simple meal comes together with less than ten ingredients and the flavors are truly amazing.
Between the tangy balsamic, tart cranberries, sweet orange juice and pungent rosemary, you get a little bit of everything here, and more. You get a new tradition! Whatever you do, make it special and enjoy it with special people.
Cranberry Balsamic Salmon
Ingredients
- 10 ounces Salmon , 2 filets (5 ounces each)
- 1 cup Cranberries, frozen then thawed
- 1/4 cup Balsamic Vinegar
- 2 tablespoons Orange Juice
- 1 tablespoon Maple Syrup
- 1 tablespoon Rosemary
- Salt and Pepper to taste
- 2 tablespoons Cranberries, extra for topping
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 F.
- Add the 1 cup of cranberries, balsamic vinegar, orange juice, maple syrup and pulse two or three times in a blender or food processor to make the glaze so that there are chunks of cranberries still in glaze. Measure 1/4 cup of the glaze and set aside.
- Using a cast iron skillet, spread 3/4 cup of the glaze on the bottom of the pan in an even layer reserving the 1/4 cup you set aside for the top of the salmon.
- Add the salmon to the cast iron skillet. Lightly spray each salmon fillet with a touch of olive oil then sprinkle with salt and pepper. Spoon the reserved 1/4 cup of cranberry glaze on top of the salmon then add the rosemary. Add the 2 tablespoons of extra cranberries on top of each salmon filet.
- Bake in the oven at 350 F 18-20 minutes. Turn the oven off and turn the broiler on high. Broil 2-3 minutes until glaze is thick and the salmon is flaky.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
This was a great way to use up the leftover fresh cranberries I had post-holiday! I quadrupled the salmon and doubled the sauce and it worked out well. I still had enough sauce to flavor the rice I served with this dish. Yum!
Yum! This would be good with chicken too!
Definitely!
Just tried this and we’re keeping it! Lovely combination. Maybe slightly too much vinegar for our tastes but that’s easy to remedy. Being British, cranberries are associated with Christmas, not Thanksgiving. My wife and I have a tradition of eating fish on Christmas Eve (*) and we may well choose this recipe this year.
Thank you.
(* Not a particularly British tradition but common in much of Europe.)
Nice work! My family eats fish for Christmas Eve as well. You can’t go wrong. If it’s too much vinegar, you can always scale back. I find everyone has a different tolerance when it comes to vinegar but it’s easy enough to adjust.
Now that is a Rebecca-Approved dish!
Thanks girl!
Salmon goes so well with berry flavors–I also love it with blueberry!
Oh yes! That’s one of my summer favs.
This has my name written all over it! I love salmon, and I love sweet-savory combos. What a perfect dinner!
Thanks Blair! Hope you have a wonderful holiday.