Restaurant-Worthy Baked Salmon At Home Isn't Complete Without This Creamy Sauce

Salmon is a perfectly flakey and delicious fish whose thick, bright pink filets are elegant centerpieces for a special dinner at home. Baking salmon filets is simple, passive, and takes just enough time for you to prepare a restaurant-worthy cream sauce. Florentine sauce is as elegant and flavorful as a salmon filet, making it the perfect pairing.

Despite its Italian reference, Florentine sauce is a staple of French cuisine that dates back centuries. More than just a sauce, Florentine is a general term that alludes to the presence of spinach as a main ingredient in a dish; take, for example, quiche Florentine or the popular Americanized chicken Florentine casserole. Adorning fish with a Florentine spinach cream sauce was one of the first written Florentine recipes. So, using a Florentine cream sauce for baked salmon is a classic French approach.

Like many famous French sauces, Florentine sauce is a simple yet decadent blend of aromatics, butter, spinach, and cream. Tasting Table's recipe for salmon Florentine prepares the cream sauce in the 12 minutes it takes the salmon to bake. Simply saute minced garlic in butter, add baby spinach and seasonings like crushed red pepper and salt, and, when the spinach is wilted, finish with a splash of heavy cream. The dairy richness from the butter and cream, subtle vegetal notes from the spinach, and a spicy aromatic finish are a trifecta of savory flavors to complement the umami-rich salmon.

When you pull the freshly baked fish out of the oven, you can add it skin side down to the saucepan with the Florentine sauce, using a spoon to baste some of the cream over the salmon. If you'd rather keep that crisp exterior of the baked fish, then you can plate a few spoonfuls of the Florentine sauce, placing the salmon on top. The presentation alone is restaurant-worthy, but the taste is the true star of the show.

You can also make Florentine sauce more of a creamed spinach side dish by doubling the amount of spinach you add to the pan. Creamed spinach Florentine is a side dish and sauce all in one easy pan. At the other end of the spectrum, you can make the sauce more saucy by adding vegetable or chicken stock and a dollop of ricotta or cream cheese along with the cream. A more voluminous Florentine sauce would season the baked salmon and provide a sauce for a foundation of fettuccine, mashed potatoes, or polenta.

You can give any flakey, firm fish the Florentine treatment. Halibut, cod, and tilapia would all be worthy salmon substitutes to bake or pan-sear and serve swimming in spinach cream sauce. In the absence of fish, chicken or poached egg Florentine would make for a restaurant-worthy meal. For a vegan twist, you can use oyster mushrooms or tofu steak, swapping heavy cream for full-fat coconut milk.