American · Hawaiian · salad

Lomi Lomi Salmon

Lomi Lomi Salmon reads heat 4.4, sweetness 4.1 and salinity 3.8 on Palate's 0–10 flavor X-ray — a American · Hawaiian salad, about 51 hr 20 min. Measured from the recipe itself: ingredients and technique.

The flavor X-ray — six axes, 0–10

• Umami & Savory — 4.0 / 10
• Sweet & Fruity — 4.8 / 10
• Sour & Bright — 2.3 / 10
• Bitter & Earthy — 0.9 / 10
• Rich & Fat — 0.5 / 10
• Aromatic & Spice — 4.8 / 10

The measured notes (of 18)

Heat 4.4 · Sweetness 4.1 · Salinity 3.8 · Allium 3.0 · Herbaceous 2.7 · Fruity 2.2 · Sourness 2.1 · Umami 1.5 · Bitterness 0.7 · Earthy 0.7 · Floral 0.6 · Citrus 0.5 · Richness 0.5

What's in it (8)

• salmon belly — 450 g
• salt — 60 g
• tomatoes — 700 g
• sweet onion — 220 g
• spring onions — 90 g
• water — 120 g
• hot chili pepper — 5 g
• water — 120 g

Time & effort: about 51 hr 20 min (20 min active) · effort: medium

Nutrition (per 100 g, engine-estimated): 14.5 kcal, 0.5 g protein, 0.2 g fat, 2.9 g carbs

Dietary: Contains meat · Contains seafood — engine-derived; double-check anything allergy-critical.

How it's cooked (7 steps)

1. Lomi lomi means to massage or rub, and it is the technique and the name: the cured salmon is worked between the fingers with the tomato and onion until it breaks into shreds and the juices run. It is a fixed part of the luau plate alongside kalua pig, poi and haupia. Its history is a small essay in itself — salted salmon was not Hawaiian, it arrived in barrels with nineteenth-century New England whalers and Pacific Northwest traders, and Hawaiians adopted it into a preparation that is otherwise entirely their own. The tomatoes and onions came later still. It is a Native Hawaiian dish assembled from what the ships brought, which is true of a great deal of Hawaiian food and does not make it less Hawaiian.
2. Cure the salmon yourself. Bury the fillet in the alaea salt in a non-reactive dish, cover, and refrigerate 48 hours, turning once. It will firm noticeably and go translucent at the edges. Alaea salt — Hawaiian sea salt with red volcanic clay — is the traditional cure and gives a faint mineral note; it ships from several Hawaiian salt works.
3. Rinse the cure off, then soak the salmon in the ice water for 1 hour to pull the salt back to a level you can eat. Taste a sliver: it should be assertively salty but not painful. Pat it dry and cut it into 1 cm dice, or shred it with your fingers.
4. Put the salmon, tomatoes, onion and chile in a wide bowl and lomi them — work the mixture between your fingers for about 5 minutes, squeezing gently, until the tomatoes give up their juice, the salmon shreds and everything is loosely bound in a pink liquid. Do not use a spoon; the hands break the fish the right way and a spoon just stirs it.
5. Chill 2 hours so the salt draws more juice out and the whole thing goes cold and slushy.
6. Fold in the spring onions just before serving and put a couple of ice cubes into the bowl, which is how it is served on a luau table and keeps it cold and slightly diluted. Eat it with poi or rice.
7. Substitutions: fillet can stand in for the salmon belly.

Dishes with a similar flavor shape

• Quesadillas con Flor de Calabaza — Mexican
• Butternut Squash in Green Curry Sauce — Thai
• Charleston Red Rice — Southern · Lowcountry
• Koki (Steamed Black-Eyed Pea and Palm Oil Cake) — Cameroonian
• Chow Chow (End-of-Garden Relish) — American · Appalachian

Keep reading: what heat, sweetness, salinity mean in the flavor lexicon · the world's cuisines, by flavor.

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Every number above is Palate's engine-measured estimate, computed from this recipe's ingredients and techniques — not human-tasted ratings or reviews.