Salmon Foam – Spuma Fredda di Salmone

A light and elegant antipasto from Marcella Hazan, made with canned salmon, lemon, and whipped cream, simple, refined, and surprisingly versatile.

This post marks the beginning of a series exploring Marcella Hazan’s Antipasti recipes, those small, elegant plates that open a meal with charm and balance. This particular recipe, Spuma Fredda di Salmone, has remained unchanged throughout Marcella’s books, apart from a slight variation in presentation notes, and an early experiment with it’s name. It was initially presented as Cold Salmon foam¹, which changed to Cold Salmon Mousse², then finally Salmon Foam³ in later editions of her work.

Long before farm raised Norwegian salmon became common in Italian markets, canned salmon held pride of place in Italian pantries. Much like their mastery in elevating humble canned tuna, Italian cooks developed inspired dishes using canned salmon, with this Salmon Foam being a delightful example. When Marcella wrote her books, salmon was not as widely or affordably available as it is today. While we now have easy access to fresh salmon, it’s worth remembering just how versatile and useful canned fish can be, especially when choosing sustainably sourced options.

Marcella Cold Salmon. Mousse Hazan, Marcella. Koizumi, George. "The classic Italian cook book: the art of Italian cooking and the Italian art of eating." Macmillan London. 1973, 1978, 1980. p29

This salmon foam was incredibly easy to prepare. I used canned red salmon, which offers a richer flavour compared to pink salmon, though either type can be used, or even freshly cooked salmon that has been cooled. I've enjoyed serving this dish as canapés on little squares of bread brushed with olive oil and grilled, paired beautifully with Marcella's Tasty Carrot Sticks (Bastoncini di Carota Marinati) and the Peppers and Anchovies antipasti. It also works perfectly as an aperitivo served in small lettuce cups, exactly as Marcella suggests. Leftovers even made for an exceptional breakfast spread on toast with a boiled egg.

Though my culinary instincts tempted me to add capers or dill, I held back, committed to cooking Marcella's dishes exactly as she instructs. As always, she proved right: this salmon mousse is wonderfully balanced, standing beautifully on its own or with just subtle flavour enhancements added as garnishes.