Thai Salmon Fishcakes with spicy dipping sauce

Thai Salmon Fishcakes are made with canned salmon for convenience, and plenty of delicious Thai flavours. These fishcakes make a quick and easy main served with saucy noodles and a fresh salad or you can serve them as an appetiser with a spicy cucumber and peanut dipping sauce. 

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Thai Salmon Fishcakes

Thai salmon fishcakes are one of my favourite appetisers when I’m visiting a Thai restaurant. I do enjoy the combination of Thai flavours with salmon. The spiciness really wakes up your palate in anticipation of the main meal to come.

What I also love is the spicy dipping sauce that is served alongside the fishcakes. I’ve been experimenting at home, and I think I’ve finally come up with a comparable version of my own. It’s based on a standard Thai sweet chilli sauce that you can buy in any supermarket, but with a few additions to elevate it to a new level of deliciousness. I’ve given instructions for making it below.

My version of Thai salmon fishcakes is made with tinned salmon, which makes these fishcakes super quick to prepare.  They are flavoured with Thai red curry paste for the heat, and lime juice for freshness.  They also contain chopped green beans, as per the authentic Thai version, but you can leave these out if you prefer, or swap them with spring onions.

Although these salmon fishcakes are normally served as starters, there’s no reason you couldn’t serve them as a main meal. I like to serve them with saucy noodles (instructions below) and a fresh green salad. And when you realise that these fishcakes take less than half an hour to make, I’m sure you’ll agree that they make the perfect quick and easy midweek meal.

What you will need

Equipment

For the fishcakes you will need a mixing bowl and a non-stick frying pan.

To make the sauce, you will need a sharp knife and a chopping board. It is difficult to recommend a knife as I always think knives are a matter of preference, so I’ve included a link to all the knives on Amazon. I would suggest getting a knife sharpener so you can keep your knives in tip-top condition. In my opinion, there’s nothing more dangerous than a blunt knife.

Ingredients

**You can get the complete list of ingredients and full instructions on how to make Thai salmon fishcakes on the printable recipe card at the end of this post.**

This recipe will make 10 fishcakes, which will feed 2 to 3 people as a main meal, or 4 to 6 people as an appetiser.

Salmon Fishcakes

• Canned salmon – this should be opened and any liquid drained away. If you don’t drain the liquid the fishcake mixture will be far too sloppy. If you prefer you can also remove the large central bone but this is not necessary as it is perfectly edible and I think it adds to the texture.
• Fish sauce – this doesn’t taste fishy at all, but it provides a lovely umami flavour.
• Thai red curry paste – this is so convenient to use. It contains a blend of all the Thai flavours but without the hassel of making your own. You can find this in the Asian section of any large supermarket.
• Egg and cornflour – for binding the mixture together
• Red chilli – finely chopped – adds extra heat. You can omit this if you want a milder flavoured fishcake.
• Lemongrass paste – you can use the equivlent amount of freshly crushed lemongrass. I just find the paste is more convenient to use. You can find this in the spice aisle of any large supermarket, or sometimes in the Asian aisle.
• Fresh Coriander – finely chopped.
• Lime juice – for a hint of freshness.
• Green Beans – very finely chopped. Substitute with finely chopped spring onions.
• Sunflower oil – for frying

Cucumber and peanut dipping sauce

• Thai Sweet Chilli Sauce – you can use store-bought sauce, or make your own from this recipe for Thai sweet chilli sauce.
• Cucumber – cut into very fine dice
• Onion – cut into very fine dice
• Unsalted peanuts – very finely chopped – don’t use salted peanuts, they will make the sauce too salty.
• Red Bell Pepper (capsicum) – cut into very fine dice
• Sesame seeds to sprinkle

How to make Thai salmon fishcakes

Prep time for this dish is about 10 minutes and cooking time is only three minutes per side.

• Open the tin of salmon and drain it. Discard the liquid. Tip the salmon into a mixing bowl and flake it up with a fork. 
• Add the remaining ingredients and give it a good stir. It should be quite thick, about the consistency of raw cake batter.
• Get a bowl of cold water and use it to dip your hands while you shape the patties. If you have wet hands the batter will not stick to your fingers as you shape the patties.
• If it’s really too wet to handle then either mix in another tablespoon of cornflour, or just take a large spoon and drop spoonfuls of the mixture into the hot oil.

• Heat the oil in a frying pan, take a spoonful of batter and form it into a fishcake shape. Then drop the salmon fishcake patties carefully into the hot oil.
• Don’t let the oil get too hot – it should just sizzle gently when you add the patties.
• Fry the patties for 3 to 4 minutes per side until golden brown.  Drain on kitchen paper towels.
• Serve hot, garnished with slices of lime and fresh coriander.

How to make cucumber and peanut dipping sauce

You can make as much or as little of this dipping sauce as you will need by simple doubling the ingredients.

This is a deliciously spicy dipping sauce,

• I use approximately half a cup of my homemade Thai Sweet Chilli Sauce but you can use any bottled Thai sweet chilli sauce.
• Finely dice the cucumber, onion, peanuts and red pepper. They should be about the size of a matchhead. 
• Mix the diced vegetables into the sweet chilli sauce, pour into a ramekin dish and sprinkle with sesame seeds.
• Serve as a dipping sauce with the fishcakes.

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How to make saucy noodles

This is my favourite way of preparing noodles to go with this dish.

You will need:

• Chinese noodles – the long thin egg noodles found in the Asian aisle in the supermarket.
• Beansprouts. In the UK they are sold in packets in the vegetable section in the supermarket. I always find that beansprouts go slimy if kept for longer than 2 days. But did you know that you can freeze beansprouts? I transfer any leftover beansprouts to a plastic bag and pop them in the freezer. They are perfect to use for cooking, but you can’t use frozen beansprouts in salads. You do need fresh beansprouts for salads.
• Dark soy sauce.
• Oyster sauce.

To make them:

• Cook sufficient noodles according to the package directions. You will need approximately 2 ounces (60 grams) of dried noodles per person.
• Once the noodles are cooked, transfer them to a colander to drain and set aside.
• Now add the beansprouts to the saucepan (either fresh or frozen beansprouts is fine). You will need half a cup of beansprouts per person.
• Add one tablespoon of oyster sauce and one tablespoon of soy sauce per person.
• Cover the saucepan with a lid and leave on a low heat for about 5 minutes until the beansprouts are soft. Stir occasionally.
• Add the drained pasta and stir so that the sauce coats the pasta and the beansprouts get distributed through the pasta.
• Serve hot with the fishcakes.

Can I freeze these fishcakes?

I wouldn’t try to freeze the batter.  It is too runny and I don’t think it would defrost very well.

The cooked fishcakes can be layered between wax paper and frozen for up to 3 months.

To reheat fishcakes that have been frozen, first let them defrost in the fridge. Then shallow fry in hot oil for a couple of minutes until heated through and crisped up.

You could also place them in a single layer on a baking tray and place this in a hot oven for about 6 minutes until heated through.

Other Thai recipes

Why not take a look at some of my other Thai Recipes

• Pad Thai Noodles with chicken and prawns
• Thai Meatballs with satay sauce
• Thai Lettuce cups
• Thai pork mince stir fry with green beans

The recipe

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