Lohikeitto

Ingredients

• Salmon fillet — in 3 cm cubes500 g
• Salmon head and bones500 g
• Waxy potatoes — diced500 g
• Leek1
• Carrot1
• Single cream250 ml
• Allspice berries8
• Bay leaves2
• Dill40 g
• Butter40 g
• Saltto taste

Salt and spices grow more slowly than the rest: doubling a dish does not double the pepper.

Weight converts to ounces and volume to cups. Grams of flour are not turned into cups, because that depends on how tightly it is packed.

Method

1. 1

   Cover the head and bones with a litre and a half of water, add the allspice and bay, and simmer twenty-five minutes, skimming. Strain it.

   30 min

2. 2

   Fry the leek and carrot in butter for five minutes without letting them colour.

   6 min

3. 3

   Pour in the strained stock, add the potato and cook fifteen minutes until soft.

   16 min

4. 4

   Add the cream and warm it without boiling. Season.

   4 min

5. 5

   Slip in the pieces of salmon and hold them at a bare simmer for exactly five minutes. The fish should stay in whole pieces.

   6 min

6. 6

   Ladle into bowls and add a knob of butter and a generous handful of dill to each.

About the dish

The fish goes in for the last five minutes and no longer. Salmon cooks almost instantly, and overcooked it falls into flakes and clouds the soup.

The stock is made from the head and bones, which give gelatine and a flavour fillet cannot. Without them lohikeitto becomes a creamy soup with fish in it rather than a fish soup.

The dill goes into the bowl rather than the pot, and in a quantity that looks excessive. Boiled, it loses everything within two minutes.

Worth knowing

• — Rinse the head before boiling and remove the gills: they give a bitterness that ruins the whole stock.
• — The potato has to be waxy. A floury one disintegrates and clouds the soup, and what is wanted is clarity with defined pieces.
• — Never boil the soup after the cream goes in. Boiling splits it and grains appear on the surface.

Nutrition

Per serving at the base yield, calculated from the ingredients rather than measured in a lab.

Calories

520 kcal

Protein

32 g

Fat

32 g

Carbs

26 g

More from Finland

• Karelian pies — A rye shell filled with rice porridge, brushed with butter out of the oven and served with egg butter.