Baked Salmon Filet with Rice Crispy Cereal Recipe

I marinate this baked salmon filet with teriyaki sauce and then top it with rice crispy cereal, which helps to keep the salmon juicy, tender, and delicious. My baked salmon Asian inspired recipe is nut-free and a quick and easy weeknight dinner. Serve with rice or mashed potatoes. This is great over a fresh green salad, for a warm wilted salad!

Disclaimer: Please check that all ingredients are suitable for your allergies and be sure to ask your medical care team regarding any allergy related questions (I do not share medical advice). As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Update: I updated this post on March 27, 2024 with edits and more information. After 10+ years of blogging, I added some thoughts about how to evaluate allergy related health claims. Since sesame was added as a top 9 allergen thanks to the FASTER act, I can now confirm that Mr. Yoshida sauce does not contain sesame. I left the description of how challenging it is to confirm whether a product contains a non-top allergen ingredient because there’s still more opportunities for food manufacturers to be helpful.

Asian Fusion Salmon Inspirations

As an Asian-American, I love Asian fusion style foods and recipes because they’re basically a mashup of the best flavors and foods from Asian recipes with ingredients and techiniques from other cultures. It’s been a long time since I’ve been to an Asian fusion restaurant due to severe nut allergies. At one point, we couldn’t even step foot into a room where nuts were served the day before without an allergic reaction.

Some Asian fusion restaurants serve salmon filets that are encrusted with nuts which sounds delicious. I got the idea to top the salmon with rice cereal for a similar crunchy texture from a Japanese sushi roll called salmon crunch maki. Salmon crunch maki is a cooked salmon sushi with bits of tempura pieces for the crunch.

Using rice crispy cereal is a quick and easy substitute for deep fried tempura pieces and a great way to finish up a bag of rice crispy. Rice crispy cereal is usually nut-free and free of top allergens, but it’s important to check the ingredient label. You can make your own teriyaki sauce for this recipe.

Baked Salmon That’s Not Overcooked

My children like to eat salmon and after ordering it a few times, they decided that they don’t like “Restaurant Salmon” because they’re too dry and overcooked. The reason that my children like home-cooked salmon is because the marinade adds flavor and the rice crispy cereal toppings helps the salmon to stay moist and juicy while the cereal becomes even more crunchy while baking.

For this recipe, I like to buy Atlantic salmon fillet pieces from Trader Joe’s because they have the best price. Their packaging keeps the salmon fresh. If I don’t cook the salmon right away, I store them in the coldest part of my refrigerator (usually the back) with an ice pack. Otherwise, use the same day as purchase for optimal freshness.

Select similar size and cuts of salmon so that all the pieces will cook evenly. A center cut piece will be thick and the tail will be thin and they may cook unevenly if baked together. If you buy a whole filet from a store and cut the salmon into smaller pieces, add more toppings on the salmon tail pieces to insulate them. I like the richness of the belly half and look for pieces that have nice big white lines for a juicy piece of salmon that has a lot of fish oil.

Preparation tips:

1) Avoid handling the salmon too much, I recommend placing the fillet skin side up on a cutting board in the sink while removing the scales with a knife and rinsing with cold water.

2) If you have any concerns about choking on bones, salmon just has big bones that are easy to find and remove with a pair of fish tweezers (affiliate link). The tweezers don’t have to be fancy, I have a $2 one from an Asian kitchenware store.

3) Baking fish usually dries out it out but I have discovered that baking with a topping keeps it nice and moist.

Recipe Variations:

You can make variations of this baked salmon by trying different toppings. If you have tried other toppings that you would like to recommend please share in the comments below!

• Green Onions: Green onions is a healthy, fresh, allergen free topping option. My friend Sarah at Get Allergy Wise shared how her mother in law makes it in 15 minutes. One of my son loves the green onion toppings so I’ll put extra green onions on his serving.
• Fried Onions (contains wheat): This is probably the most tasty topping and has extra calories (not always a bad thing!).
• These variations have evolved into a baked salmon recipe which uses scallions and fried onions.
• Panko (contains wheat): This is my least favorite topping but I want to mention it anyways to save you the trouble. It doesn’t have as much flavor as the green onions or fried onions, it’s not beautiful nor tasty. I don’t recommend it.

If you have a soy allergy, try other sauce flavors such as a sweet chili sauce, sweet and sour sauce, orange or lemon sauce that do not contain the allergens you are concerned about. Add the sauce and topping and bake in the same way. You use my soy-free soy sauce recipe to make some soy-free teriyaki sauce to adapt this recipe to be free of top allergens.

Learning to Evaluate Health Claims

When my younger son was first diagnosed with food allergies as a toddler, I read many books about food allergies including one book in which the author suggested dietary changes to improve chances of outgrowing food allergies, asthma, autism, and ADHD. I couldn’t eliminate wheat and dairy as the author suggested because our list of life threatening food allergies was already quite long.

After discussing with our allergist about whether the book and author was a credible source, I decided that adding omega 3 oil rich foods such as salmon to our diet in moderation might be beneficial for our general health. Your doctor can give you the best advice.

It’s important to consider whether any treatment claims are too good to be true. If it were that easy to do xyz, then we can do it and move on. But solutions are not so straightforward and there are so many co-factors which contribute to a medical condition. Check PubMed for any scientific evidence based on research or clinical trials. For example, a study from Norway found this result, “Eating fish at least once a week at one year of age was associated with a 28-34% reduction in the odds of current eczema, asthma, and wheeze at six years of age.”

Food Allergy Labeling Challenges

Update: I just called the toll-free number on my jar of Mr. Yoshida sauce and learned that Kraft-Heinz will label their products with either a “Contain” or “May Contain” label for the top 9 allergens, which include sesame. Thank goodness for a helpful and positive call today because the original conversation from 10 years ago described below was ridiculous.

When my son was allergic to sesame, Mr. Yoshida Sauce was the only product I could find that didn’t obviously contain sesame. To verify the allergen safety of the sauce for friends with food allergies who come to eat at our house and for Nut Free Wok readers, I called the 800 number on my jar of Mr. Yoshida Sauce and the representative wouldn’t disclose any possible allergens not included in the top 8, such as sesame citing that the ingredients are proprietary.

How to Offend a Food Allergy Mom…

The representative did say that an individual can ask their doctor to fax a letter (with letterhead) requesting more information. I will not ask my doctor to spend time helping me with a bottle of sauce.

The representative added that anyone with life threatening allergies to foods not included in the top 8 allergies should avoid their products.

Better Consumer Experience Are Needed

While it might be good advice not to use their product, I felt like that company didn’t care about my business. I wonder if food manufacturers realize the significance of such a simple statement such as not using their products at all? Not every food allergic consumer is aware of the nuances of food allergy labeling and if the labels aren’t transparent then millions of Americans living with food allergies could potentially risk their health and well-being by using their products.

He was very pleasant and assured me he would pass on my comments to their product development team. I prefer to support brands that are willing to disclose their ingredients, share allergen advisories, and/or have allergen safety protocols in their manufacturing process to protect their customers’ safety. If there are any food manufacturers reading my blog, I would love to talk with you and hear about your allergen friendly business practices.

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Baked Salmon Fillet Recipe

I marinate this baked salmon filet with teriyaki sauce and then top it with rice crispy cereal, which helps to keep the salmon juicy, tender, and delicious. My baked salmon Asian inspired recipe is nut-free and a quick and easy weeknight dinner. Serve with rice or mashed potatoes. This is great over a fresh green salad, for a warm wilted salad!

Course Main Course

Cuisine Asian inspired, Japanese

Keyword baked salmon, salmon with teriyaki sauce

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 12 minutes

Total Time 22 minutes

Servings 4

Author Sharon Wong at Nut Free Wok

Ingredients

• 4 6-ounce salmon fillets
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1 tablespoon dried parsley
• 1/4 cup teriyaki sauce
• non-stick cooking spray or brush your foil with oil at step 1
• 4 tablespoons rice crispy cereal

Instructions

1. Preheat oven 350°F. Line a baking sheet with foil or parchment paper for easy clean up.

2. Scale (as needed) and rinse fillets with cold water, pat dry with paper towels. Sprinkle each fillet with garlic powder and dried parsley.

3. Pour teriyaki sauce on the foil lined tray. Place the salmon fillets skin-side up on the sauce to coat the flesh, then spray the skin with non-stick cooking spray. Turn the salmon pieces over (skin-side down) and sprinkle each fillet with rice cereal, pressing down gently.

4. Bake for 10-12 minutes (or more, depending on size, thickness, or if cold and straight out of the refrigerator) on the middle rack, adjusting for the thickness of the fillets, the salmon is ready when the sides of the fillets look cooked, the salmon flakes easily when poked with a fork, and the seasonings on top of the fillet turn slightly brown.

Related Recipes:

I’m interested in knowing if you try the recipe and what you think. If it’s difficult for you to find a teriyaki sauce to buy, you might want to try my homemade teriyaki sauce recipe! I love Japanese food and often cook with teriyaki sauce.

• Fast, easy, healthy side dish for a vegan side dish: Pan Fried Tofu with Teriyaki Sauce
• Instant Pot Chicken Thighs with Teriyaki Sauce Recipe is super hands-off and great for days when it’s too hot to cook but you need to make something
• I love chicken drumsticks because they’re delicious and inexpensive. You do have to keep an eye on it for the first few minutes when broiling but the results are worth the effort, Super Easy Chicken Drumstick Recipe
• Oyako donburi is one of those perfect meals that you can prep ahead on a Sunday and cook it on Monday and have leftovers for Tuesday. Oyako Donburi (Chicken & Egg Over Rice) Recipe
• But what if you don’t love salmon but want a different kind of fish recipe? You must try this Chinese Style Steamed Fish. It’s a classic Chinese New Year recipe that can be eaten all year round.

Do you have a favorite brand of allergy safe teriyaki sauce that you use? Share in the comments to help other readers. Also check out what’s in my cupboard for other nut-free ingredients that I use.

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Disclosure/Disclaimer:

I may mention the names of stores and/or brand names of products that I use because readers ask and I share products and sources which I use and think may be helpful to readers, all opinions are my own. Please note that manufacturing practices and ingredients can change at anytime without notice and readers are always responsible for assuring allergen safety before buying or consuming foods. NutFreeWok.com is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com. Thank you for reading!