Hot smoked sockeye salmon congee is just the thing for savory breakfast lovers and comfort food appreciators. Think of this rice porridge as a blank canvas, one that you can bring to life with salty morsels of wild-caught fish and a few complementary toppings.
What Is Congee?
Many of us may have first come to know rice porridge as a Chinese dish called congee. However, a diverse range of Asian cuisines make their own variation of rice porridge, from India to Japan. Each tradition typically favors its own regional grain of rice and adds in its own regional flavors. Often, it’s enjoyed in the mornings or when you want a mellow meal that’s easy to digest.
How to Make Congee
Our recipe for rice porridge skews toward the Eastern traditions of rice porridge, using a short-grain white rice that releases its starches more slowly than long-grained varieties. Giving the rice a rinse removes excess starch from the grains so that the porridge is light and silky instead of gummy. Soaking the rice, also, is crucial to developing the ideal texture. Skipping this step might save you a little time, but it produces an unappetizing, gluey porridge.
We’re using peppered, hot smoked sockeye salmon as our star protein, and Japanese-inspired toppings. Soy-marinated eggs, boiled just until the yolks are just starting to set, are a great addition to this rice porridge — especially if you’re having it for breakfast. We like The Kitchn’s method of making eggs with jammy yolks, so that’s what we’ve used in this recipe to get the eggs just right.
To finish off the rice porridge, all it needs is a spoonful of the leftover marinade (a balanced blend of soy sauce, mirin, and rice wine vinegar), a glug of roasted sesame oil, a scattering of scallions, furikake or a few sheets of nori broken up on top, and maybe a handful of tender greens. But don’t let us limit your imagination. Top this completely customizable meal with whatever sounds good to you today.
