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How to salt herring pieces at home

How to Salt Herring in Pieces at Home

Quick, easy, and incredibly tasty! Home-salted herring is in another league from the store-bought kind — much tastier and better for you, with no questionable additives. Salting the herring in pieces also shortens the curing time.

katushafin

Recipe author

Composition / ingredients

Servings:

Herring

Water

0.5

Onion

Bay leaf

Allspice

Peppercorns

Sugar

Salt

Translation table of volumetric measures

Nutrients and energy value of the composition of the recipe

By weight of the composition:

Proteins 47 % 8 g

Fats 29 % 5 g

Carbohydrates 24 % 4 g

89 kcal

GI: 25 / 0 / 75

Cooking method

Step 1:

How do you salt herring in pieces at home? Gather your ingredients. Thaw the herring ahead of time by moving it from the freezer to the bottom shelf of the refrigerator. Leave it slightly frozen, which makes it easier to fillet. Any onion works — I used red.
Step 2:

Wash the herring, cut off the head, and gut it. Mine had soft roe (milt), which I'll salt along with the fish. If you find roe, even better — it's a treat.
Step 3:

To fillet it, lay the fish belly-down and press along the backbone with your palm, flattening it out. This loosens the bones from the flesh.
Step 4:

Turn the fish over onto its back and use a knife to lift out the backbone and ribs. Pick out any small bones by hand.
Step 5:

Now split the fish in half along the backbone — you'll have two fillets. Skin each one and cut it into serving pieces.
Step 6:

Peel the onion and slice it into half-rings.
Step 7:

Lay a bed of onion on the bottom of a glass jar. Add half the herring, then another layer of onion, then the rest of the herring.
Step 8:

Make the brine. Pour water into a small saucepan and add the salt, sugar, and spices.
Step 9:

Bring the brine to a boil over medium heat and simmer for three to four minutes. Let it cool.
Step 10:

Pour the cooled brine over the herring in the jar.
Step 11:

Leave the jar out on the counter for about three hours, then move it to the refrigerator. The herring will be ready in 24 hours.

One of the keys to delicious salted herring is choosing the right fish. It should be fresh and firm, an even steel-gray color with no brown streaks or rusty patches. The gills should be light, the eyes slightly sunken and pale. If the fish has been thawed and refrozen many times, the flesh will be too soft and fall apart as you cut it — mine was a little guilty of that. Don't thaw herring in the microwave or warm water, or it'll come out dry and bland. You can salt the fish whole; in that case you don't gut it, just remove the gills. If you're salting it in pieces, you don't have to fillet it — you can simply cut it crosswise through the backbone. For plain herring, add nothing but salt; for a richer flavor, add cloves and mustard seeds.
Note that proper thawing has a lot to do with the quality and flavor of the finished dish. To avoid mistakes and pick the best method, read our article on defrosting.
Because everyone's sense of salty, sweet, bitter, spicy, sour, and hot is different, always add spices and seasonings to your own taste! If you're using a seasoning for the first time, remember that some are especially easy to overdo (chili pepper, for example).
For the best flavor, use neutral-tasting filtered or bottled water. Tap water can give the dish an off, characteristic aftertaste.