5 Ingredient Hella Hot Baked Salmon

If you’re in love with tender soft slow baked salmon, this is the recipe for you. Forget going to a restaurant for perfectly cooked salmon, make slow-baked salmon at home and impress all of your friends and family.

Perfect salmon

This salmon is cooked just to the point of doneness, preserving its texture and flavor. To ensure a perfect cook, we’re going to slow-bake salmon filets seasoned with Bachan’s Hella Hot Barbecue Sauce, toasted sesame oil, and honey. The result is a super spicy flaky salmon that has a huge hit of heat with a touch of sweetness and nutty depth.

How to make Hella Hot slow-baked salmon

Take your salmon out of the fridge and let it temper on the counter top for a bit. Tempering is a fancy way of saying that you’re taking the chill off the salmon. When you temper fish, you’re ensuring that the salmon filet is the same temperature throughout the entire filet which will help it cook evenly.

Heat up the oven to 275°F. While the oven is heating up, whisk together Bachan’s Hella Hot Barbecue Sauce, honey, and toasted sesame oil. The honey will add sweetness and slightly temper the heat of the Hella Hot, making it absolutely addictive. The toasted sesame oil will add a slightly nutty, umami-forward undertone.

Once your marinade is ready, coat the salmon, then bake.

Once the salmon is cooked through to medium, slightly firm, flaking easily, with a pinkish center, it’s time to remove it from the oven and let it rest before tucking into some deliciously spicy salmon.

How hot is Bachan’s Hella Hot Sauce?

It’s hot! If you’ve had Bachan’s Hot and Spicy Barbecue Sauce, think of Hot and Spicy as an entry level baby spice and Hella Hot as adult spicy. Bachan’s Hella Hot Barbecue Sauce is for those people out there who want a spice that warms and intensifies. 

What’s in Bachan’s Hella Hot Barbecue Sauce?

Just like Original Bachan’s, Hella Hot has bold punches of premium brewed traditional Japanese soy sauce, aged Japanese mirin, organic rice vinegar, organic ginger, organic garlic, and green onions. To amp up the flavor, there’s also a nutty hint of organic toasted sesame oil. Tomato paste adds a round umami note and the heat comes from red jalapeños (spicier than green because they’ve had a chance to ripen) and red habaneros. Hella Hot is sweet and spicy with a strong umami punch and heat that lingers and builds. It will definitely hit your spice craving.

What tastes good with Bachan’s Hella Hot Sauce?

Truly, everything. Bachan’s is a unique BBQ sauce in that it’s not like traditional American BBQ sauce. Hella Hot can be for protein and vegetable marinades, squeezed onto rice or noodles, as a dip, as a basting sauce, as a soup base, and for stir-fries. Hella Hot is especially amazing on wings, and of course, this slow-baked salmon.

Why slow-bake salmon?

Slow-roasting or slow-baking salmon at a low temperature results in a flaky, super tender perfectly cooked fish that’s extra buttery and soft. Slow-baking means it’s almost impossible to overcook your salmon, which means you’ll never have to suffer dry salmon again. Your salmon will be luscious, silky, and evenly cooked.

Is it better to cook salmon at a low temperature?

Yes! When salmon is overcooked, it gets tough and dry. Cooking at a low temperature ensures your salmon comes out just right. 

What temperature should I bake salmon at?

The ideal temperature to bake salmon at is 275°F, low enough that the salmon cooks slowly, ensuring it stays juicy, but high enough so you’re not waiting forever for dinner.

What kind of salmon should I buy?

The debate in the salmon world is farmed vs wild salmon. The decision is up to you, but which salmon you buy will help determine how long you cook it for.

Wild salmon is notoriously easy to overcook because it’s so lean. It tends to be a bit drier because it doesn’t have as much fat, so you need to keep a closer eye on it to ensure it doesn’t overcook. Because it’s leaner (thanks to its active lifestyle) wild salmon is a touch more firm.

Farmed salmon is naturally fattier than wild because the salmon doesn’t have to work as hard. With its higher fat content, farmed salmon tends to be more moist and tender than wild. Compared to wild salmon, it’s less prone to being overcooked.

How to prep salmon for cooking

To ensure even cooking and evenly sized filets, cut your own from a large center-cut of salmon. Each filet should be about 1.5-2 lbs. If your salmon comes skin on, be sure to cook it skin side down as an extra protective layer against the heat of the oven.

What is the white stuff that comes out of salmon?

The white stuff is albumin, proteins that cook faster than the rest of the salmon. When salmon is heated, the albumin seeps and congeals into a slightly unappetizing white coating, but the truth is, there’s nothing wrong with it. It’s flavorless and completely safe. Albumin exists in salmon in a liquid form when raw, but exposing it to any amount of heat pushes it out and makes it semi-solid.

How to avoid albumin?

Cooking your salmon slowly and not exposing it to high heat will lessen the albumin on the surface of your salmon. You can also salt or marinate your salmon to give it a bit more of a protective barrier that will minimize the formation of albumin. It’s not completely avoidable because you can’t remove the albumin proteins from the inside of salmon. If you really don’t like the way it looks, use a spoon to gently scrape it off before serving.