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Most home cooks pay close attention to internal temperature when cooking a steak, where we know just 5 degrees means the difference between rare and medium-rare. But few people pay that much attention when dealing with fish. Which is too bad, because even fatty fish like salmon can go from tender and moist to chalky and dry in a flash. In the test kitchen we use an instant-read digital thermometer to tell when salmon is done and we’ve always preferred it cooked 125 degrees for the ideal balance of firm, yet silky, flesh. The majority of the salmon we cook is farmed Atlantic, but as we’ve cooked more wild species we started to wonder if 125 was maybe a bit too high.
Learn about our favorite instant-read thermometer:
To find out, we bought multiples filets of the four most common species of wild Pacific salmon—king (also known as Chinook), sockeye, coho, and chum. We cooked samples of each to both 120 degrees and 125 degrees sous vide, or sealed in a plastic bag and cooked in a temperature-controlled water bath. We also did the same for samples of farmed Atlantic salmon. We then asked tasters, blind to the differences in internal temperature, to pick which sample had the best texture.
Everyone preferred the coho, sockeye, and chum samples cooked to 120 degrees and the farmed Atlantic cooked to 125 degrees. While a few folks preferred the king sample at 125 degrees, the majority preferred 120 degrees.
These results may sound surprising. After all, salmon is salmon right? Well, not exactly. It turns out that farmed Atlantic salmon differs in two important ways from the half dozen commercial wild varieties caught in the Pacific Ocean:
1. Due to their more sedentary life, the collagen protein in farmed Atlantic salmon contains less chemical cross-links than in wild varieties, which translates into softer flesh.
2. Farmed Atlantic salmon contains more fat than any wild variety and up to 4 times as much fat as the leanest species. Fat provides the perception of juiciness when cooked.
So, with naturally firmer flesh, and less fat to provide lubrication, wild salmon can have the texture of overcooked fish even at 125 degrees. By cooking wild salmon to just 120 degrees the muscle fibers contract less and stay moist and tender.
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most wild salmpn is FAKE
get your funeral insurance straight before you eat farm fish
Farmed????????
Please note that; 4x more fat means 4x more Pb and anti-biotics…
Do not eat farm salmon just because of the taste. You will be getting the most toxic food in your body stream. Do not eat fish at the restaurant since it is most likely farmed fish.
Ever since I watched this video, this has been a game changer. No more overcooked salmon!
Propaganda! They lace farmed fish with antibiotics and other chemicals to get them rid of sealice. They're usually sick and deformed, and they color salmon pink artificially! This can never be more tastier than wild salmon you idiots!
I prefer eating raw Sushi Grade Salmon anyway so I can't relate. Always tender with a clean flavor.
So glad you included a warning as to the likely possibility people face when "under cooking" wild salmon as you so carelessly recommend they do. Lol
Farmed salmon is often full of antibiotics and other toxins. Watch the video on Norwegian farmed salmon.
Never ever eat a Salmon that is not wild
he said chinook wrong
This reminds me of more-expensive cuts of meat vs cheaper. More-expensive cuts of meat tend to be better if cooked to a lower temp
Sponsored by farmed salmons corporations?
Farmed salmon are nasty. So sad that so many people even think they're worth eating.
Wild salmon you don't even need to cook. Once you have a can of that stuff you'll feel more nutrified than you've ever felt in your life. Or you can have it candied.
Even sadder still that there probably won't be any left in a generation. And then "farmed" with PCBs is all we'll know. Humans are really destructive bitches.
We get sockeye salmon imported into the UK and great cachet is attached to it being wild, even though there is a massive hatching release programme in commercial pacific salmon fisheries.
Bottom line is that it doesn't taste as good as even a farmed atlantic salmon. Fat content is lower, flake quality is poorer and it has a strong, almost overpowering salmon taste. I think it's ridiculous that stuff is flown half way around the world to be honest. Eat it in Alaska and Canada by all means. It's your native fish, but selling it here is dumb.
Not to mention how many fat-soluble pesticides and crap are in farmed salmon. Do your research. I'll never eat farmed fish again.
everyone bitching about using C instead of F…… dont use either, use both for everyone
Plus #3: Farmed Salmon is pretty much the most toxic food you can buy. It contains unregulated pesticides, antibiotics etc. So shell out the extra money for wild fish, particularly salmon.
120F is not enough to ensure the fish is safe to eat…
What was the time for cooking these in sous vide? It’s very forgiving but curious what time they cooked for.
killed Monsanto
How do one recognize a good sushi grade salmon and tuna?
Tasmanian farmed are almost impossible to tell from wild… They are taking out the dye in the food..
TO The Editor
A 1985 Canadian Government Agenda to Severely Harm Wild Salmon in British Columbia Waters, Exposed.
This Canadian government Agenda to destroy and replace our Wild Pacific Coast Salmon, our Coastal Communities, and all of the coastal Riparian Ecology with, Multi-National Corporate Salmon Farm Feed Lots was announced quietly and out of the Public Eye in 1985. This whole agenda can only remind me of things like "" The Small pox blankets initiatives of the 1800's.""
Evidence is found here::
“” The Days of common property Fishing are Over”
http://alexandramorton.typepad.com/alexandra_morton/2013/01/salmon-feedlots-this-was-not-a-mistake.html
The following are some of my thoughts coming out of the latest Brave attempts to Remove Salmon Farms from BC Coastal waters.
(( The Mifflin Plan, designed to break the $financial$ backs of our Salmon Fishermen and introduce Salmon Farms and the disease that comes with them, has without a doubt worked.
The destruction of our Wild Commercial Salmon populations and the redistribution of Salmon from the people of BC to Global Corporations IS what has happened. This is Crystral Clear now isn't it. ))
(( "Scotland's and Irelands Salmon have never returned, Norway's Salmon haven't returned, Chili's Salmon, Our East Coast Salmon, Our West Coast Salmon are now not returning It is Clear, open net salmon farms are destroying all of the Worlds incredible magical Wild Salmon. tearing down a massive riparian Ecology with it.
Uncontrollable sea lice and Disease plus a Huge array of other issues from these farms, are no doubt, 100% the reason. They Know it, We Know it, and Hopefully We All Know it. How can our Department of Fisheries be so vemonous toward our Ecology and People. ))
( ( Warning "" This is a Very Grave and Scary Message. "" Slice, a sea lice killing poison, or any other Human made chemistry can never be an Ecological Solution; Not in the Open Ocean.
Baby Wild Fish attracted to Fish Farms get Lice, eat farm pellets, get infectious disease and then try to make it out to open waters to grow. An Ecological Disaster is spreading throughout our Ecology.
These specific Drugs and disease is changing everything about Mother Nature's ways and will end up Destroying millions of years of Natural Oceanic Balance. After doing a lot more research, I have to conclude that we may already be too late. These diseases will not go away. I remember Norway Stating that one or more of these virus's had travelled thru-out their coast and they could not fix it. HOW?? Pour Rotenone all over the Ocean, they thought about it!! This was years ago. The Grave potential is that this has also happened here in Canada and it could well spread throughout Many species. "" We Must, Get Fish Farms out of our Water NOW>""))
(( Alaska's Fish and Game are responsible for incredible Wild Salmon returns. Some enhancement, some ranching, some simple hatchery programs, but Mostly allowing Natural methods to work. The jury of the oceans, takes a much longer time for success to be a success than a few salmon cycles. No, matter what, the oceans provide only so much fish, something has to give when Humans interfere. Therefore, for me the jury will be out for a long time to come. And anyway, Who wants to feed more People? Answer. (( the $$$BLIND$$$. ))
It IS Time For All Of BC to Stand up for Our Wild Ecology.
Scott Fennell jr.
I like my salmon cooked to about 65 degrees
Instructions unclear. Cooked salmon at 120 Celsius, now looks like grandma's ashes.
he fine
salmonella
pink salmon are the most common salmon
Friends don't let friends eat farmed salmon
i smoke my salmon i use a water pan cook to 150f never dry comes our great
I'm 13. Why am I here
Be careful of those Parasites in the wild ones. Don't eat them raw!
Are you joking? Cooking fish above 50 degrees is mental! Is this a real cook? 120?? wat?
Very interesting video! But since your audience isn't only American and to avoid confusion, I would suggest 1. Stating whether you are using fahrenheit/celsius and 2. offer temperatures in both fahrenheit and celsius so both American and non-American audiences can understand.
Either that, or just teach teach the metric system in your school systems like literally every other country on earth 😉
145 degrees is more proper for cooking fish instead of 125.
chalky? Been cooking since I was 6 y.o. and i never seen "chalky" salmon. If you're making salmon that gets chalky you probably shouldn't be giving lessons on how to cook lol and I'll take that farmed salmon over that dry "wild caught" anyday. Fat is not only where the flavor is, but where the health is.
Excuse me, ist dass echt F° oder du meinst C°?
Whatever the science, the wild cooked to 120 and the Farm cooked to 125 is a good thing to know.
other than the health benefits, salmon is one of my least favorite fish to eat.
Collagen?!? Sorry but your graphic is displaying DNA. Collagen is a pair of spiral protein sheets that do not intertwine but lay side by side.
wow and I was cooking salmon bake at 270 and +
Salmon is the only food in the world that lets you know when it's cooked to perfection. When you see the white stuff coming out of from the flesh, that means it's cooked. That white stuff is just melted far from inside the fish. Cook salmon 5-10 minutes past that point, you're gonna have dry tough salmon. I'm not a chef, or a trained cook. I'm just a simple guy from Alaska who is enjoying catching, cooking, and eating salmon. Specially this summer when it's salmon season.
was very interesting to know, thanks!
where is the best place to buy decent wild salmon from? i'm going to stop eating farmed salmon but i also want to avoid mercury and other bad stuff possible in the wild salmon
Please use C!
Hi, I wanted to mention something without trying to be a word nazi, just in case you wanted to know. Chinook is pronounced "shinook" (well, really it's sorta like halfway between "shinook" and "shinuck").
The way this video should have gone: "We noticed that cooking these four species of fish from one particular genus at 125 degrees gave a different result than cooking this one other species from a different genus at 125 degrees, so we changed how we cook them."
nonsense.