
All of the salmon dishes that I’ve prepared continue to be simple in prep and quick to the table. No exception here.

I raided the gourmet olive bar at my local market, picking an assortment of black olives, Kalamata, a couple different shades of green olives and some toes of roasted garlic.
This made for a colorful presentation not to mention a unique and exciting combination of flavors for this poached salmon meal.
The salmon was delicate in flavor and tender in texture cooked in a good quality white wine and olive oil. I used Kendall-Jackson 2012 Chardonnay, which also makes for a nice pairing for the meal.

Salmon filets were simply placed in a baking dish and surrounded by the assorted olives and roasted garlic. I added a few pearl onions and a sprinkle of golden raisins.
I then poured the white wine over the olives until the liquid reached to the top of the salmon. I mixed a pinch of turmeric into the wine so the white onions would glow yellow. I sprinkled everything with a pinch of red pepper flakes, zest of one lemon, salt and pepper.
I halved a lemon and squeezed the fresh juice over the whole dish and added a generous drizzle of olive oil over the salmon. The dish slow baked, covered, at 300 degrees for about 20 minutes, or until the fish was steamy and flaky.
In the meantime I tossed some butter lettuce with red onion, diced orange bell pepper and tomatoes with our favorite bottled Italian dressing. A great little meal, short on effort and big on flavor.

Salmon Poached in White Wine with Olives and Pearl Onions
Ingredients
- 1/2 pound to 3/4 salmon filet
- 1 cup assorted pitted olives
- 1/4 cup pearl onions
- 2 cloves garlic
- 1/8 cup olive oil
- 1/2 cup white wine
- Zest and juice of one lemon
- pinch of red pepper flakes
- salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Pour olive oil In a shallow oven proof bowl. Next place salmon filet in oil skin side down. Arrange olives, onions and garlic around the salmon. Pour wine over everything. Top the salmon with lemon zest and then squeeze the lemon juice over all of the ingredients. Sprinkle with red pepper flakes and salt and pepper. Bake until flaky, about 20 minutes, depending on thickness of salmon.
Nutrition
Wine Poached Salmon Fillet with Olives and Pearl Onions…It’s What’s For Dinner
Made this for dinner for Liz and Jordan for their first dinner home after having their baby, Clive and they loved it and so did we!!! Served it with rice and asparagus! Thanks for such a yummy idea! BTW, I am a Grandma!!!!!
Fabulous!!!!! So glad you gave it a try and thanks for letting me know. And congrats on that Grandma thing. I’ll send you an email.
You prepared that so elegantly, Lea Ann, and the photos are spot on. Great post.
Well, it might not be sausage, but it does look and sound incredibly tasty!!!
Thank you Jenn.
Wine, lemon AND olives – my mouth watered while reading this. Nice combination of flavors. Funny you should mention bottled dressing. Like you, I rarely buy it or use it, but my MIL bought a bottle for a favorite old shrimp sauce recipe and I love having it sitting in the fridge door for those days when I’m flying low at dinner time.
favorite old shrimp recipe???? Would you like to share? 😉
What, no sausage Saturday? We need to have a talk!! I still have some wild caught salmon in the freezer. Thanks for a new recipe idea, Lea Ann.
Believe me, my husband would celebrate Sausage Saturday. And if I didn’t have an inconvenient day job I could organize enough to have a Sausage Sunday.
Dang, that looks good. I’ll have to try this with the wine and olives next time.
The salmon is wonderful. tysm. I think I will also try it on my haddock fillets next week. I do have one comment though, on your choice of salad dressing. You make such delish food, why would you use such a horrible italian bottled dressing. It is soooo easy to make your own italian dressing without the nasty chemicals of store bought. If I must use bottled, I buy Newman’s own as his dressings are always trustworthy. I think I even have his original recipe in one of his cookbooks. Kudos on the salmon recipe though it is unique and tasty.
Thanks Jodie. I think a white fish would actually make a better presentation with the golden sauce and all of those raisins. I couldn’t agree more about those bottled dressings, I make my own vinaigrettes/cream dressings 99% of the time, however there are those times when I’ve worked long and late hours at the office, and even the slightest bit of preplanning seems overwhelming. That’s when I grab Wishbone. We prefer the flavor of the Italian over Newman’s.
You are the queen of salmon recipes Lea Ann. Another winner and I love the olives. We eat salmon often and always enjoy how easy it is to prepare.
Sam
Thanks Sam.
Your salmon posts remind me that Saturday has arrived (yet again!) and it’s hard to believe how quickly the week went. I should make better use of the olives at the grocery store. I am overwhelmed by the choices and don’t know where to start. I’ll follow your lead!
Holly, I just grab a contained and had a few from each bin. We love snacking on all the different options.
Salmon and olives sounds good to me. I’m thinking Bob should start a blog about Salmon Saturday :-). I hate I forgot to leave your gift of salmon.
LOL – I’ll suggest it to him.