The only pink sauces I can think of that are good with salmon are thousand island sauce and seafood cocktail sauce. I think I'll need some more information before I can venture a guess.

Was it
-creamy?
-gravy-like?
-cold?
-warm/hot?
-spicy?
-fruity?
-thick?
-thin?

She thinks it was translucent, thin, light pinkish orange color, and fruity. I'm wondering if it were some sort of cloudberry sauce. Or some other classically Scandanavian fruit sauce.

Lingonberry sauce?

Here is a link that might be useful: salmon with lingonberry sauce

bbstx:
Does this sound like it ???
A lot of reading but actually " Simple "
LOU

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Gordon Ramsay
Serves 4

Some fruits are multi-functional and go with sweet and savoury recipes. Pink grapefruit is one fruit we use in desserts and savoury sauces - not just the juice and zest but also the pretty translucent tear-shaped segments to mix into vinaigrette dressings and hot buttery hollandaise. It looks stunning with pan- roasted salmon fillets - perfect for a fast and flash special supper. Serve with baby new potatoes and green beans or a salad.

4 fillets salmon, skin on, about 120g each
2 tbsp olive oil
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Sauce:

2 tbsp white wine vinegar
150g unsalted butter
1 pink grapefruit
2 free-range egg yolks
6 coriander seeds, crushed
1 tbsp chopped fresh coriander
1 tbsp chopped fresh mint

1 First, make the sauce. Boil the vinegar down in a small saucepan until reduced to 1 tablespoon and immediately tip into a cup. Needless to say, this takes seconds. (We make reduced wine vinegar 500ml at a time and store it in a small bottle).
2 Then melt the butter over a gentle heat and carefully pour off the golden oil into a jug and discard the milky solids. Set the oil aside to cool until tepid.
3 Grate a teaspoon of the grapefruit zest and set aside. Cut off the thick skin and white pith, then slicing between the membranes cut off the segments. You only need about four for this sauce. Cut the segments over the cup with the vinegar so the juices drip into the cup.
4 Place the four large segments on a plate and using the prongs of a fork break the flesh into tiny segments. Set these aside.
5 Put the yolks, crushed coriander and a tablespoon of cold water into a heat-proof bowl that will fit snugly over a pan of gently simmering water.
6 Using a hand-held stick blender or electric whisk, beat the yolks over the heated water until very light and frothy. This helps the butter emulsify more easily.
7 Remove the bowl from the heat and continue whisking for a couple more minutes, then slowly trickle in the tepid runny butter as you continue to whisk. Dont add the butter too quickly or it
will curdle.
8 When all the butter is incorporated, season and add the reduced vinegar and any juices and grapefruit zest plus the tiny pieces of grapefruit flesh. Then fold in the coriander and mint. Set the bowl back over the pan of hot water but off the heat, and stir it occasionally to stop a skin forming. This will be enough to keep it still soft.
9 When ready to serve, brush the salmon with the oil. Heat a large nonstick frying pan until you can feel a strong heat rising. Lay the salmon fillets in skin side down and turn the heat to medium. Season the top flesh. Cook for about 5 minutes on the skin - it should become quite crisp. Flip over and cook the other side for 2-3 minutes until slightly springy. Remove and allow to stand for 5 minutes before serving with the warm sauce.

Thanks all.

Lindac, I thought about lingonberry sauce, but I think it is too red...from what Mother describes.

Lou, that pink grapefruit sauce sounds wonderful. I'm giving it a try SOON!

If she was in Norway, it was most likely lingonberry sauce of some sort.
A sauce would be made with lingonberry preserves and white wine or white wine vinegar or raspberry vinegar.
And it would be only as red as the amount of lingon berries you used.

bbstx:
Thanks, It may be close to what you are looking for.

Wish I could take some credit for the Recipe.

Jim : The Salmon Man. Are you listening ???

Have you done any Pink Recipes like this one described ???

LOU

I'm listening, Lou. Not only am I listening but my grandparents were Scandinavian (Danish). I have no clue about a pink sauce for fish though. The cooking at home was done by my mom and that wasn't the Danish side of the family.

Related, but slightly OT, I just got back from the harbor where I got a trash barrel full, about 60 lbs., of striped bass fish frames from a charter boat guy who was filleting as I watched. I wanted these to fertilize my garden. I think I will set a few aside for fish stock. They still have a lot of meat on them and I iced them right away. If I cooked them all I could probably make 40 or 50 gallons of stock.

Jim

Jim: OK! You're excused. Get you fish buried. I don't know about the stock.
The markets not too good right now. LOL!
What do you do with 50 gallons ?
I love fish but that's going a little Overboard.

We went fishing often in Maryland and Delaware Bay's.
Always buried the scraps after cleaning the fish.

The Tomato trunks were about 2 inches round.
Beefsteak Tomato's big as a Dinner Plate.
A Zuccini 4 foot long.

I heard that !!!!! I have witnesses to this but we ate al the evidence with Mayo.

LOU

Overboard ?

So, you're saying that, the market being what it is, my stock is pretty much worthless? Since stocks have turned to ___, I might as well use it all for fertilizer?

That's an astute observation, Lou.

Jim

One thing that makes a sauce pink is red caviar which is very common in Scandinavian cooking.

Jim: Getting a little touchy.
I didn't say that, you did.
Was only joking.
You shouldn't take too much Stock in that.

I don't know if I ever had a disconcerning attitude as to what you do.
Or else I wouldn't have called on you, now

Although, I may have had different opinions, on things ?

I still don't know what you do with 50 Gallons of

LOU

Jim, aren't you going to have every cat (and dog and raccoon, and bear and fox) in town hanging out around your garden? Do you set up a bar and let them socialize?

It's common in "fishing cabins" to bury the fish parts in the garden. Only a cook would make fish stock.....and only a retired person trying to live on an IRA would equate stock with....well what Jim said!
Momj47...the raccoons are what keep the garden soil always tilled!
Linda C

You are all so nice to help me out with the sauce ideas! I'll have to cook lots of salmon for Mom so she can try all these delicious sauces.

Sorry, Lou. I didn't intend anything touchy, just playing with words and making some silly puns. Making silly remarks has gotten me in trouble more than once. :-)

Linda nailed it with "...only a retired person trying to live on an IRA would equate stock with....well what Jim said!" That's me, a retired guy living on my IRA, which might as well be fertilizer. BTW, if you are looking for a fertilizer stock, check out CF INDS HLDGS INC COM CF: NYSE

It did enter my mind that buried fish heads might attract animals; all the ones mentioned by momj47 plus a few more. Except bears. We don't have bears. I'm counting on the fact that this will be in the middle of a large, fenced community garden where the only real critter damage has been done by voles. I can't explain why deer, raccoons and other critters haven't gone over the fence because they easily could. We shall see.

Now I have really hijacked the thread, haven't I? Apologies for that too.

Jim

Jim:
I don't think that was remark was meant for you,
" only a retired person trying to live on an IRA would equate Stock with Fertilizer"
Some people have answers for everything, don't they.

A fire has to be stirred to keep burning right.

Who would know more about Fertilizer than Fertilizer itself.

If it sounded like I equated your 50 Gallons of fish Stock, to fertilizer, I'm sorry.

Don't think you will have to worry too much about Animals.
I haven't had any problems with buried fish.

What you will have to worry about is the Vegies that grow.
I made up a Spray that keeps Deer away.
I'll have to try it out for Squirrels and Raccoons.
Later Lou

PS: Sorry this got off the topic.

I lived in Norway in '85-'86 with a Norwegian family. They used 'remoulade' sauce on lots of things. It was kind of a pink/salmon color with some sweetness to it. The texture was thin-creaminess. It sometimes had chunks of 'something' in it. They bought it ready made - it came in a tube (like toothpaste). I googled Norwegian remoulade and found a few things/recipes that sounded like it would taste like what I remember.

Did your mom have this sauce in a restaurant or in someone's home?

I agree with momj that red caviar is very common, at least where I lived. I never saw a lingonberry the whole time, though. My family just might not have liked that. Back in the '80s, small towns didn't seem to have a lot of diversity in food or restaurants. People just didn't go out much in that area of Norway. I ate out 3 times the whole year. And that was with my boyfriend. His mom would cook for us a lot. She made the best waffles!!!

"They used 'remoulade' sauce on lots of things."

That's what my sister told me after her trip to Denmark years ago. I had forgotten until I read your post and wouldn't have remembered that it is pink anyway.

I think the mystery is solved.

Jim

BUT...bbstx said that the sauce was thin, translucent and fruity....
Doesn't sound like remoulade to me. And it doesn't sound like a salmon roe sauce either.

Yeah but trsinc said the texture was thin-creaminess.

And the "some sweetness to it" could explain the fruitiness.

Jim

bbstx mom is remembering a meal from 20 - 30 years ago, so it may not have been fruity, or it may not have been pink, or it may not have been translucent, all she knows for sure is that it was salmon, probably.

I have a couple of Scandinavian cookbooks which have recipes for salmon with a roe sauce (pink), artichoke sauce with apple (fruity), ginger glazed salmon (translucent), dill and mustard (none of the above).

If you search for recipes, there are many more sauces.

If this was in a restaurant, the chef probably made up the sauce.

I don't know about the sauce, but Jim, when we went fishing Grandma always made us bury the heads/etc in the garden.

She swore that if you were planting tomato plants, you should dig a hole, add a fish head, then the tomato plant. They grew very well, I remember. That was before we raised cattle for fertilizer, LOL. I don't remember animals digging in the garden and we lived on the farm, so I know there WERE animals. Maybe they were just afraid of Grandma, with very good reason to be.....

Annie

bbstx:
Sounds like ,

trsinc,
( I think ) is the closest. Closer than the Recipe I entered.
But you won't know until your Mother tries them.
I think maybe everyone is just Guesstamating ?

Cook up some Salomn, will you !!!!!

Annie:
You're right .
The Pilgrims learned that from the Indians, when planting Corn, Remember ?

There were all kinds of animals around then.
Haven't had any Indians tell me
" Lou, don't do that, the animals will dig them up "
Have a nice day everyone.
LOU

yes, Lou, I remember my native american heritage. I also remember that the Pilgrims would most likely have starved to death the first winter, had the natives not helped them.

Still, I have lots of cow manure and few fish heads, so my fertilization techniques have changed to utilize what's available.

Fish stock, now THAT's a much better use for those fish heads today, at least in my opinion.

Annie

Annie:
Can you do an experiment ?
Like with the same Tomato Plants. Put a lot of Fish Heads around one, or two , no Cow Manure.
To see if there is a difference.
Lou

I set aside one head and one tail for stock. That was all I needed for my biggest stock pot, 16 qts. There's that accusatory eye of the big fish, "How dare you catch me?".

The rest of the fish are now buried in the hills of my three sisters garden, except for two beautiful roe sacs which I am working on.

Jim

Annie:
Jim:
In the 80's I did a lot of work for a good friend,the Mayor of Sharon Hill, Pa.
He owned a Barber Shop there and gave me bags of hair to spread around the Perimeter,
of mine and a friends garden. It kept the animals away.

I make up a spray now, to keep Deer away.
LOU

Lovely picture, Jim. Looks like a set up for Manet!!
Linda C

I really appreciate all of you sharing your thoughts, ideas, and recipes on this topic. Of course, each time I present a new idea to Mother, she says she doesn't think that is it. I think momj47 probably hit the nail on the head. It was nearly 30 years ago and memories are often vastly different from reality.

I agree with momj47. Memories are often sketchy and even distorted, especially about things like flavor.

I also agree with Lou. Cook up a couple of salmon recipes. Even if they don't solve the mystery, your experiments will be tasty.

I'm still betting on the remoulade sauce.

Jim

I really like pink peppercorn sauce with salmon.

Jim, I would agree on the remoulade, except Mom is familiar with remoulade. Of course, when I read the wikipedia entry concerning remoulade, the ingredients in the Danish version where considerably different from what we are accustomed to.

bbstx:
I have a good solution.
Cook up about 4 or 5 Different Sauces and I'll come to test them, with your Mom.

I'm always sacrificing myself to testing.
Lou

Lou, LOL...sounds like a plan!