Smoked Salmon Appetizer - a delicious and easy smoked salmon appetizer recipe that is perfect for the holidays! A crowd favorite!
Ingredients
Cucumber Cups:
3english cucumbers
4ouncessmoked salmonor lox
3tablespoonscapers
Garnish: fresh dill
Dill Sauce:
⅓cupsour creamregular or dairy free
⅓cupcream cheesesoftened, regular or dairy-free
2tablespoonsfresh dillchopped
2tablespoonsfresh chiveschopped
2tablespoonsfresh parsleychopped
1teaspoonfresh lemon juice
1teaspoonlemon zest
1teaspoongarlicminced
1teaspoonrice vinegar
¼teaspoonkosher saltmore to taste
⅛teaspoonground black pepper
Instructions
Prep Cucumbers: Gather ingredients and cut each cucumber into 1 ¼ inch tall pieces. Scoop out the inside using a small/narrow spoon, being careful to not puncture the bottom. You should end up with approx. 15 cucumber "cups." Set aside.
Make Dill Sauce: In a medium-sized bowl, combine the Dill Sauce. Stir and taste. Add additional salt, pepper or dill, as-desired.
Make Cups: Taking one cucumber cup at a time, add a small piece of salmon, a dollop of dill sauce, 4-6 capers and tiny piece of dill for garnish. Repeat with remaining ingredients.
Serve: Enjoy immediately or cover and place in the refrigerator until serving time.
Notes
Amount: makes approximately 15 smoked salmon appetizers - feel free to double/triple/etc. as-needed
Dairy-Free: you can easily use dairy-free sour cream + dairy-free cream cheese to make this dairy-free.
Make Ahead: You can make these overnight, just make sure they are stored in an airtight container - I wouldn't recommend making them more in advance than that as the cucumber may lose some of it's crispness.
Modification: instead of making cucumber cups you can simply serve on a large slice of cucumber!
Lox: we have a tutorial on the site for how to make lox if you are interested (hello yummy lox bagel)!
Hot Smoked Salmon: we also have a recipe for more of a hot smoked salmon on the Traeger (complete with smoked salmon brine) if you are interested in that!