Salmon Teriyaki

This is my default salmon recipe. The sauce takes 5 minutes to make and is way better than store-bought. Ingredient table at the bottom scales up or down easily.

Teriyaki Sauce

Ingredient	Full Batch (4 servings)	Half Batch (2 servings)	Single (1 serving)
Soy sauce	1½ cups	¾ cup	6 tbsp
Cooking sherry	1 cup	½ cup	¼ cup
Vegetable or canola oil	½ cup	¼ cup	2 tbsp
Sugar	1 cup	½ cup	¼ cup
Garlic powder	½ tbsp	¾ tsp	⅜ tsp
Ginger (fresh grated or powder)	½ tbsp	¾ tsp	⅜ tsp

I use low-sodium soy sauce. Regular soy sauce makes this too salty.

Directions

Make the marinade. Whisk everything together until the sugar dissolves. Set aside ½ to ⅔ for glaze later — don’t let it touch raw fish.
Marinate.
Filets: Coat both sides, cover, refrigerate 1-2 hours. Flip once.
Cubes: Cut into 1" chunks, toss with marinade, refrigerate 30-60 minutes. The photo above is the cubed version — more surface area, cooks faster.
Bake at 400°F. Line the sheet with foil. The sugar will caramelize and stick; foil saves you from scrubbing.
Filets: 10-12 minutes depending on thickness. Pull when the center still looks a bit translucent — it’ll finish cooking after you take it out.
Cubes: 8-10 minutes, stir once at 5 minutes.
Broil the last 1-2 minutes. Watch it — sugar burns fast. You want dark, sticky edges.
Make the glaze. While the salmon bakes, heat the reserved sauce (the stuff that never touched raw fish) in a small saucepan over medium-low.
Slurry: 1 tsp cornstarch + 1 tbsp cold water.
Once simmering, whisk in the slurry + 1 tbsp sugar. Stir 3-4 minutes until it coats a spoon. Let it cool a couple minutes; it thickens more as it sits.
Spoon off the oil layer that rises to the top, or blot with a paper towel.
Glaze and serve. Brush or drizzle over the salmon. For cubes, I toss them in a bowl with the glaze.
Serve over rice. Spoon extra glaze on the rice.