Name: Baked Salmon with Salsa Verde
Prep time: 5 min
Cook time: 20 min
Total time: 25 min
Cuisine: Mexican
Ingredients: 1 Jalapeno; 1/2 lbs Tomatillo, 4-6 medium small green tomatoes; 1/4 Cup Vegetable Stock, or water; 1 Garlic, clove; 1/4 tsp Salt, adjust per taste; 1-2 tsp Canola Oil, for roasting tomatillo; 1/2 Cup Cilantro, leaves and stem, a generous handful; 1-2 tbsp Lime, juice, more per taste; 1/2 White Onion; 1.5 lbs Salmon, 4 filets; Salt and Black Pepper, per taste; Oil Spray, for coating the sheet; 2 Cup Rice, cooked; 1 Lime, juice of one lime, 1-2 tbsp, extra wedges for serving; 1 tbsp Canola Oil; 1/2 Cup Cilantro, chopped fresh leaves, chopped

Let's start Monday healthy, full of omega-3s, less fat, and herbaceous, zippy, and spicy Mexican flavors... and let's not work more than 25 minutes to put this dinner together! How awesome is that?!

Yes, my friends! I'm taking about a 10 minute perfectly baked salmon with delicious roasted salsa verde and cilantro rice for dinner!!

It may not be called "one pot meal" but this flavorful meal just needs a sheet pan, sauce pan (for cooking rice), and a blender/food processor. That won't be hard, isn't it?

Oh, and if you have bowl of leftover/precooked rice, then this dinner will fly from kitchen to dinner table, under 15 minutes! (minus sauce pan from above list)

Salmon grilled, baked or broiled... makes a delicious lite dinner. Plus when served with something lemony and herbaceous like salsa verde, it makes me look forward to dinner. I'm always on look to cook salmon different ways for easy and healthy weekday dinners. One thing I have learned while exploring all the recipes so far.. salmon, lemon and herbs make a match no one can't resist.

Perfect and easy oven baked salmon dinner with side of cilantro rice and salsa verde | chefdehome.com

Speaking of which, I always like to give credit to everyone who inspires me for a delicious weekday meal. So, for this recipe, credit goes to America's Test Kitchen. These guys never fail to amaze me with their tricks and simple recipe ideas. This recipe was no different. It was so simple and straightforward that I have not changed much! (so unlike me)

Of course the Salsa Verde is my old recipe and decide to use that instead of Test Kitchen's and made a few tweaks in cooking....

Speaking of which, I'm sharing this old picture of Salsa Verde from my Breakfast Chilaquiles post!

Look at the picture! This bowl of beautiful green roasted tomatillo salsa is bursting with flavor!

The Best Roasted Salsa Verde with a little secret to keep it lush green | chefdehome.com

What I love most about this Salmon Dinner?

1. The ease of cooking without using many pans and pots. Most work is done in oven, from roasting tomatillos to baking salmon.
2. I often have some leftover rice... Or boiling a fresh batch takes 12-15 minutes. By the time veggies are roasted and salmon bakes... rice are ready! A quick mix of cilantro, salt, some oil and lime juice enhance the flavor of rice and compliments the roasted Salmon perfectly.

Test Kitchen has shared perfect instruction to bake salmon. They ask to score the fish on skin side, heat the oven at 500 degrees and then lower it at 350 to bake perfect flaky salmon in just 9-13 minutes.

I preheated the oven to 500 and first used it to broil tomatillo, white onion and jalapenos. After roasting tomatillos, I left the oven on and reduced the temperature to 350... then seasoned the fish to my liking and baked it in just 10 minutes! How easy was that?!

Actually, it can be even quicker if you have some leftover salsa from weekend salsa party. ;-) Serve a few tortilla ships on side for picky eaters and everyone will happy on Monday dinner table. :)

Tell me?! Who will say no to this beautiful plate of dinner?!? - Perfectly baked flaky salmon soaking in salsa verde with side of cilantro rice!

Perfectly flaky omegas rich oven baked salmon ready in just 10 minutes | chefdehome.com

Diet Info:

Just so you know, this salmon dinner is low in fat, has good serving of Omerg-3s from salmon, lots of Vitamin-C and antioxidants from salsa verde. If you trying to limits carbs, eat a controlled portion of rice as per your diet-need.

Baked salmon dinner is also Gluten-Free. If you can serve this with veggies noodles instead of rice, it can be paleo too.

Make-Ahead?
It is not that hard to invest 20-25 minutes for a healthy dinner for weekdays. However, some days when I'm super time-pressed... I finish a lot of the work a day-ahead.

Let's see how:

1) Cook and cool rice. i even mix in seasonings and refrigerate a day before. I like to add fresh cilantro just before serving.
2) I often make Salsa Verde in advance. If I have leftover salsa from a recent spring party... a salmon with salsa dinner is in my near future! ;-)
3) For weekday dinner, just baking fresh salmon and taking rest from refrigerator makes dinner a 10 minute piece-of-cake! and yummy too!

Perfectly baked salmon with roasted salsa verde and cilantro rice for dinner | chefdehome.com

Oh, if you like to use frozen salmon (I'm doing this a lot for weekday..) then don't forget to take it out of freezer and leave in refrigerator section in morning. Or if you forget, just submerged it fresh water and it thaws pretty quickly.

I'm addicted to serving this easy baked salmon with Salsa Verde for weekday dinner! What is you favorite easy pairings with baked salmon?

I wish you a wonderful week ahead!

Have Great Day!~Savita

If you like seafood, you will love these recipes:

Miso Ginger Salmon with Kale and Quinoa Grilled Chimichurri Shrimp and Couscous Salad Spicy Shrimp Fried Rice