Salmon With Shrimp? Shrimp Stuffed Salmon Recipe From Grandma's Kitchen Will Become Your Favorite!

Salmon recipes are pretty much all the same. Baked salmon, grilled salmon, smoked salmon, just variations with slight differences. This family favorite will change the way you make salmon forever! It's too good to keep it to just myself and kids, so I have to share! Even my son learned how to make this one! He wanted to make sure that one of his favorites would not disappear if I did! When my son was a teenager, his friends would lie to their parents when they knew I was making certain things for dinner. Mike would come to me and say that such and such a friend was allowed to stay for dinner if I said yes, and when I did, the friend would call his mom and say that I had invited him. The parents would call and ask me and of course I would support them in their lie. I always knew which recipes each friend loved and always made enough for them to stay. I think that during my son's teenage years, I fed half of his friends most of the time. People would wonder why I spent so much on food with just 3 kids. Well, I was never feeding just 3 kids. I was always feeding 4 to 6 teenagers and they can eat!

This meal was Adam's favorite and he is one of my favorites! If I was making shrimp stuffed salmon, he was at the table before my own kids were! He is a grown, married man now- in his 30's and if he knew this was on the menu, he would probably lie to his beautiful wife and say he was here fixing something in my house. And I would support him in his lie.

This is a perfect Sunday dinner or a great meal for special guests, such as your kids' best friends, who later on in life, WILL actually come and fix things in your house. You will always get a big bear hug from them, too!

This recipe is made up of a nice salmon filet, baked with lemon, salt and pepper, with a scoop or two of homemade bread stuffing on top and then smothered in a shrimp white sauce. It might sound complicated, but it really isn't, and any extra effort rquired will be well worth it!

A Simple Bread Stuffing

1. 6-8 slices of sourdough bread, cut into one inch pieces and toast on a cookie sheet in a 350 degree oven. When the bread is toasted on all sides (about 20 minutes), take it out of the oven and put it into a large bowl to cool.
2. 1 medium onion, diced
3. 2 cloves of garlic, diced
4. 8 to 16 ounces of button mushrooms, diced
5. 1 stick of butter
6. salt and red pepper flakes to taste, about a half teaspoon of each
7. canned or boxed low sodium chicken broth, a cup or more, depending on how much you need to moisten your bread mixture
8. 1 or 2 beaten eggs

While the sourdough bread is baking, saute the onion, salt, pepper and garlic in a large saute pan in which you have melted the butter. When the onions are tender, add the diced mushrooms. Saute until the mushrooms are tender. Allow this to cool for about 10 minutes. In the meantime, pour the beaten eggs evenly over the toasted bread. Stir. This will help the stuffing stick together. When the onion mixture has cooled a little, pour it over the bread and mix together. Now, you will need to add some chicken broth to this and mix. I do this with my hands because I want all of the pieces of bread to have some moisture and I can feel the texture with my hands. The texture that you are looking for is this: When you pick up a handful of the stuffing, you want it to kind of stick together, with all of the ingredients equally moist. Not wet enough to be dripping with chicken broth, but moist enough so that you can tell it will not be dry after it is baked. After you have achieved that texture, pour the stuffing into a well-sprayed 2 quart casserole. You can bake this ahead of time or when you put the salmon into the oven. It is to be baked at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes. Depending upon the size of your salmon filet, it can go in a few minutes sooner or at the same time as your salmon.

Baked Salmon Filet

1. 1 and a half to 2 pound salmon filet (A filet is better for this recipe because it has less bones)
2. sprinkle of salt, pepper and olive oil over the top of the fish
3. juice of 1 lemon on the top of fish

Spray a baking pan and put the filet in, skin side on the bottom. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes for a one pound filet or 30 minutes for a larger 2 pound filet (I recommend a 2 pound filet that way you might be lucky enough to have some leftovers)

Shrimp White Sauce

This is the best sauce for salmon that you will ever have! It is easiest to use pre-cooked, shelled shrimp for this recipe (you know, the kind that comes frozen, in a bag). If you prefer, you can use fresh shrimp, clean it and shell it yourself and then pre-cook it before adding it to the sauce). I always buy whatever is cheapest. When shrimp is on sale (usually once a month), I buy it and freeze it for later use. I buy my salmon the same way. If I can get wild caught Keta salmon for $6.99 a pound, it is certainly worth buying some to freeze. That same salmon, not on sale, can cost up to $15.00 per pound. If I am making this for my entire family, I use about 1 and a half pounds of bay shrimp, that way everyone thinks they are getting tons of shrimp. If I am making it for guests, I use a pound and a half of large shrimp. It is a more elegant presentation. When you put your salmon into the oven, prepare your shrimp sauce in a medium sized pot.

1. 1 and a half pounds of thawed shrimp, cleaned, pre-cooked, rinsed and drained
2. 6 Tablespoons of butter
3. 5 Tablespoons of flour
4. 3/4 of a teaspoon of salt
5. 1/2 of a teaspoon of ground black pepper
6. 3 cups of whole milk (you can use 1% or 2%, but I recommend whole)

You are making a simple white sauce. Melt the butter in a medium pot. Mix in the salt and pepper. When the butter is melted, sprinkle in the flour. Whisk to coat the flour in the butter and allow the flour to cook for about 2 minutes. Whisk it the entire time. Cooking the flour ensures that you won't have a floury taste in your sauce. Slowly whisk in the milk. Any lumps will disappear as the milk heats up. Bring the mixture to a full boil, stirring constantly. Allow it to boil for a minute and then add the shrimp. Mix thoroughly and heat through. Voila!

Cut your salmon filet into serving size pieces. Place a piece of salmon in the middle of the dinner plate. Put 2 scoops of stuffing on top of the salmon and then drown the stuffing in the shrimp sauce, making sure that everyone gets enough shrimp. Put the extra stuffing in a bowl. Do the same thing with the shrimp sauce and put them on the table. Put any unserved salmon on a platter and bring that to the table, too.

The only thing I have ever served with this is a fresh salad, with assorted greens and raw vegetables with a wine vinegar and oil dressing.

This really is one of my family favorites. I just made it a couple of weeks ago for my best friend. She said it was the best salmon she has ever had. I am quite sure that if I promise her this for dinner, she will even come fix something that has broken in my house!

The moral of this recipe is: always feed your kids' friends. They grow up and become electricians, plumbers, auto mechanics, computer nerds and even doctors or lawyers. I never thought of that when I was feeding them, but you now have the benefit of my knowledge. A free electrician is definitely worth the extra cost of food. It is a great investment!