Salmon with wild fennel

• By Matty Cremona

You will need:

One kilo of salmon fillet (a thick chunk), 125g of sea salt 125g of caster sugar, two teaspoonfuls of freshly ground black pepper, 100g of wild fennel fronds (chopped).

Run your fingers all over the salmon carefully to check for any stray bones, remove them with tweezers and place the fish in a shallow dish. Now mix together the sugar, salt, pepper and 75g of fennel. Press this evenly into the salmon. Spread cling-film over it (on the fish and mixture, not stretched over the dish) and on top of this lay a plate so that the weight presses the mixture into the fish. Leave it in the refrigerator for 24 hours. Don’t drain away the liquid that seeps out of the fish. Then uncover the salmon, scrape away and discard the marinating mixture, and wash the fish under cold running water. Pat it dry, sprinkle it with the remaining fennel and wrap it firmly in cling-film. Leave it for another four to eight hours, then uncover it and using a long sharp knife, cut slices at an angle. Serve them drizzled with good olive oil and with slices of foccacia bread, flavoured with fennel seeds, or with fennel-flavoured boiled potatoes.