Gravlax () or graved salmon is a Nordic dish consisting of salmon that is cured using a mix of salt and

sugar Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose, fructose, and galactose. Compound sugars, also called disaccharides or double ...

, and either dill or

spruce A spruce is a tree of the genus ''Picea'' (), a genus of about 35 species of coniferous evergreen trees in the family Pinaceae, found in the northern temperate and boreal (taiga) regions of the Earth. ''Picea'' is the sole genus in the subfami ...

twigs placed on top, and may occasionally be cold-

smoked Smoking is the process of flavoring, browning, cooking, or preserving food by exposing it to smoke from burning or smoldering material, most often wood. Meat, fish, and ''lapsang souchong'' tea are often smoked. In Europe, alder is the tradi ...

afterwards. Gravlax is usually served as an appetizer, sliced thinly and accompanied by (literally 'maitre d'hôtel sauce', also known in Sweden as , in Norway as , literally 'mustard sauce', in Denmark as , literally 'fox sauce', and in Iceland as ), a dill and mustard sauce, either on bread or with boiled potatoes.

Etymology

The word comes from the Northern Germanic word ('to dig'; modern sense 'to cure (fish)') which goes back to the Proto-Germanic , ('hole in the ground; ditch, trench; grave') and the Indo-European root 'to dig, to scratch, to scrape', and ''/'', 'salmon'.

History

During the Middle Ages, gravlax was made by fishermen, who salted the salmon and lightly fermented it by burying it in the sand above the high-tide line. Fermentation is no longer used in the production process. Instead the salmon is "buried" in a dry marinade of salt, sugar, and dill, and cured for between twelve hours and a few days. As the salmon cures, by the action of osmosis, the moisture turns the dry cure into a highly concentrated

brine Brine is a high-concentration solution of salt (NaCl) in water (H2O). In diverse contexts, ''brine'' may refer to the salt solutions ranging from about 3.5% (a typical concentration of seawater, on the lower end of that of solutions used for br ...

, which can be used in Scandinavian cooking as part of a sauce. This same method of curing can be employed for any fatty fish, but salmon is the most commonly used.

References

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{{seafood Danish cuisine Finnish cuisine Icelandic cuisine Norwegian cuisine Salmon dishes Swedish cuisine Swedish words and phrases Appetizers

Etymology

History

See also

References

Bibliography

External links