Kiawe-Planked Salmon

Plank cooking is the gentlest way to put wood flavor into fish — the board shields the delicate flesh from the grate while it smolders sweet kiawe smoke up through the fillet. Cedar made this method famous; kiawe makes it Hawaiian. The maple-garlic-shoyu marinade does the rest, and the plank you cook on gets a second life as chips.

Ingredients

• 2 lb salmon fillet, skin on
• 1/3 cup shoyu
• 1/3 cup maple syrup
• 4 cloves garlic, grated or minced fine
• 1 tsp grated ginger (optional)
• Green onion and toasted sesame, to finish
• 1 kiawe grilling plank

Cook Sequence

1. Whisk the shoyu, maple, and garlic. Pour over the salmon in a dish or bag, flesh-side down, and marinate in the fridge 2–4 hours. Do not go overnight — the salt and sugar start curing the surface and the fish turns firm and salty.
2. Soak the plank at least an hour while the fish marinates, weighted so it stays under. A dry plank burns up; a soaked one smolders and steams. It should feel heavy when you pull it.
3. Pull the salmon out and pat it dry. Reserve the marinade, simmer it 3 minutes in a small pot, and keep it for basting.
4. Grill at 375–400°F indirect. Plank on the grates alone for 3 minutes until it crackles and smokes, then salmon on, skin-down, lid closed.
5. Cook 25–40 minutes, basting once with the reduced marinade, to 145°F at the thickest point — the USDA safe temperature for fish. It will flake clean and the white beads will show.
6. Serve straight off the plank with green onion and toasted sesame.
7. Do not throw the plank away. Let it cool and dry out completely, then break or chop it up — that charred, marinade-soaked wood is your chip supply for the next cook.

Round Out the Plate

• Coconut Rice — the island default under fish
• Lomi Lomi Salmon — cold, salty, traditional
• Mango Slaw — crunch and acid