Salmon is the fish Canadians eat most often. It is also the one we understand least, which is an odd combination for something this many of us cook every week. So this ultimate guide to salmon sets out to close that gap.
The gap exists because the question has too many parts. Wild or farmed. Atlantic or Pacific. Fresh or frozen. Sockeye or chinook. Certified or not. Each of those choices arrives wrapped in marketing language, and most of that language exists to reassure rather than to inform.
Here is what actually reaches the Canadian market. Where it comes from, how the sustainability claims hold up under checking, and how to buy and cook it well.
The fish Canadians eat most, and the caveat
Start with the popularity claim, because it is more interesting than it looks. A study published in Nutrients analysed Canadian Community Health Survey data across 2004 and 2015. Salmon topped the most frequently consumed seafood list in both years, ahead of tuna, shrimp, cod, and crab. Only about 17 percent of Canadians eat any seafood on a given day, which puts the whole category in perspective.
Measured by volume rather than frequency, the picture shifts. A National Academies review found that shrimp remains the most consumed seafood in both Canada and the United States, with salmon second, having overtaken tuna.
So salmon is the finfish Canadians reach for most often, and shrimp still moves more weight. Both are true. It depends entirely on what you count, which turns out to be a decent warm-up for everything else in this guide.
The species you can actually buy
Two groups reach the Canadian market. Pacific species are wild-caught off the West Coast. Atlantic salmon is farmed, essentially without exception, for a reason we will get to.
| Species | Origin | Fat | Flavour and texture | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sockeye | Pacific, wild | Medium to high | Deep red, bold, firm | Grilling, smoking, curing |
| Coho | Pacific, wild | Medium | Milder than sockeye | Pan-searing, roasting |
| Chinook (king) | Pacific, wild | High | Very rich, buttery | Grilling, raw preparations |
| Pink | Pacific, wild | Low to medium | Light, softer | Baking, chowders, canning |
| Keta (chum) | Pacific, wild | Low | Lean, mild | Frozen fillets, roe |
| Atlantic | Farmed | Varies, often high | Varies by farm | Everyday cooking |
Pacific salmon, wild-caught
Sockeye is the most distinctive of the five. Deep red flesh, assertive flavour, firm enough to take smoke or a hard sear without falling apart.
Coho sits a step milder with medium fat. It is the weekday Pacific salmon, good in a pan and forgiving in the oven.
Chinook, sold as king, carries the highest fat content and the most luxurious texture. It rewards a hot grill and holds up in raw preparations.
Pink is paler and leaner. It suits baking, chowders, and the canning tradition that grew up around it.
Keta, or chum, is the leanest and mildest, usually sold frozen. Japanese cooking prizes its roe.
One rule covers most of it: fattier and firmer species take high dry heat, leaner ones prefer baking, poaching, or a chowder. If you want the technique side in detail, that is how to cook salmon.
Atlantic salmon, farmed
Atlantic salmon is Salmo salar, and in Canada it is farmed. Colour, fat, and texture vary considerably between operations, because they depend on the feed and the method rather than the species. The wild versus farmed comparison covers that ground properly, and oily fish versus lean fish explains what the fat difference does in the pan.
Why wild Atlantic salmon is not on the menu
This is the fact that explains the shape of the entire market, and most guides skip past it in a clause.
Canada’s wild Atlantic salmon commercial fishery did not close in one dramatic moment. It came apart over sixteen years. According to Fisheries and Oceans Canada, commercial closures began in 1984 across the Maritime provinces and parts of Quebec. Insular Newfoundland followed in 1992, Labrador in 1998, and by 2000 a full moratorium covered every commercial Atlantic salmon fishery in eastern Canada.
The numbers behind those closures are hard to look at. A House of Commons standing committee report recorded landings by all users, Indigenous, recreational, and Labrador residents combined, at just over 130 tonnes in 2015. In the early 1970s the figure was around 2,500 tonnes. That is a decline of roughly 95 percent.
Wild Atlantic salmon still exists in Canadian rivers, and it is still fished for Indigenous food, social, and ceremonial purposes and in limited recreational fisheries where populations allow. What does not exist is a commercial supply. So when you see Atlantic salmon on a Canadian counter, it was farmed. There is no third option, and any label implying otherwise is worth a second look. Anyone who wants that traceability question in general terms will find it in seafood traceability in Canada.
How farmed salmon is raised, and why the method decides everything
Farmed does not describe one practice. It describes at least three, and they are not close to equivalent.
Open net pens
Mesh enclosures moored in coastal water, fed automatically, harvested at scale. Most of the world’s Atlantic salmon comes out of these, and the design carries a structural problem: the nets are porous. A commentary in Science Advances puts it plainly, noting that aquaculture nets allow viruses, bacteria, and parasites to pass between farmed fish inside the cages and wild fish outside them.
That is the sea lice argument in one sentence, and it is why net pens sited along wild salmon migration routes draw the most scrutiny.
The 2029 ban, and where it actually stands
Here the article most guides publish is out of date, so it is worth being precise.
Fisheries and Oceans Canada confirmed in June 2024 that Canada will ban open net-pen salmon aquaculture in British Columbia coastal waters by June 30, 2029. Licence holders have to end operations by that date. Since July 1, 2024, only closed containment systems, marine or land-based, qualify for a new salmon aquaculture licence in the province.
Three things that get left out:
- The commitment is older than the timeline. The federal government first committed to phasing out net pens in 2019. June 2024 was when it finally attached a date.
- The final plan is late. The Pacific Salmon Foundation reports that the final transition plan slipped past its 2025 target. It also notes that the core scientific concerns remain unresolved.
- First Nations are asking Canada to say it again. In June 2026 the First Nations Leadership Council published an open letter on the subject. It urges Ottawa to publicly reaffirm the 2029 commitment and to say where the transition planning process actually stands.
Read together: a policy on the books, running behind schedule, with the people who have most at stake watching it closely. We would rather tell you that than pretend the file has closed.
And it only covers British Columbia. Atlantic Canada and other regions still permit open net-pen farming. A “Canadian farmed salmon” label tells you nothing about which side of that line your fish came from.
Land-based closed containment
Salmon raised on land in recirculating tanks, with no ocean contact. No effluent discharge into coastal water, no escapes into wild runs, no pathway for sea lice transfer. The technology costs more to build and run, and the honest trade-off is energy: you are using electricity to do work the ocean does for free.
What you get for that is containment. The environmental cost stays measurable and sits on the operator’s books instead of drifting out into the water. We made the fuller argument in the case for land-based aquaculture, and land-based salmon farming covers how the systems work.
Where our salmon comes from
All of our salmon comes from Sustainable Blue in Centre Burlington, Nova Scotia. They raise Atlantic salmon in a land-based, closed-loop recirculating system. The system recirculates all of its water, converts biosolids to energy, and raises the fish without antibiotics or growth hormones.
This is not the only Atlantic salmon available in Canada. It is the one we decided to carry exclusively, and why we only carry one type walks through how we reached that. The producer story itself is on the Community side.
We sell it in two pack sizes, twelve portions for weeknight cooking and meal prep, and twenty-four for batch cooking or a full freezer.
Is salmon sustainable? How to read the claims
Most sustainability language on a salmon label is unfalsifiable. Here is how to get past it.
Look for a certification with published criteria. Ocean Wise, the Marine Stewardship Council, the Aquaculture Stewardship Council, and Best Aquaculture Practices all publish what they assess and how. They are not interchangeable, and the differences matter more than people assume. Our guide to MSC, ASC and Ocean Wise labels sets out what each one actually certifies, and sustainable seafood in Atlantic Canada covers the wider landscape.
Ask what the claim is about. MSC certifies that a fishery manages a wild stock for the long term. ASC certifies a farmed operation against environmental and social standards. Ocean Wise makes a recommendation about a specific product from a specific source. None of them is a statement about salmon in general.
Know the two live issues. Sea lice from net pens can transfer to wild salmon passing nearby, adding pressure to stocks already struggling. And wild Atlantic populations in eastern Canada face habitat loss, warming water, and the legacy of historic overfishing. Recovery there runs in decades, not seasons.
Watch for the country-of-origin shortcut. A national label is not a verdict. Two farms in the same province can be a well-run certified operation and a mess. What tells you something is whether a third party audited the specific farm, and whether the seller will answer the question.
Fresh or frozen salmon, and why the answer surprises people
“Fresh” at retail is close to meaningless. It can mean off the boat this morning, or four days on ice, or frozen at sea and thawed for display. The word describes a counter, not a condition.
What determines quality is how fast the fish reached its preservation temperature and how steady that temperature stayed after.
Researchers have tested this properly. Researchers at Oregon State University‘s Food Innovation Center ran blind taste panels from 2016 onward across coho salmon, sockeye, black cod, albacore, rockfish, and scallops, with around a hundred consumers per session. In every test, fish frozen at sea rated as good as or statistically better than fish sold as fresh at the supermarket. Even restaurant chefs picked the frozen samples.
The lead sensory researcher, Ann Colonna, then added the caveat that makes the finding trustworthy. Buying fish at the dock from the person who caught it that morning still beats everything. That option is just not available to most people, and once your alternative is a supermarket case, properly frozen wins.
That is the whole argument for freezing at source, and fresh versus frozen fish has the full version.
For storage: refrigerated salmon keeps one to three days, which how long fish lasts in the fridge covers in detail. In a home freezer at minus eighteen, a fatty fish like salmon holds its best quality for two to three months, and vacuum sealing extends that. How to store frozen fish has the specifics.
How to buy salmon: four checks
Match the fish to the job. Weeknight cooking and meal prep want farmed Atlantic from a producer you trust, for consistent size and predictable behaviour in the pan. Bold flavour or smoke wants sockeye. High-heat grilling wants chinook. Lighter dishes, baking, and chowders want pink or keta.
Read the label properly. The common name of the species must appear. Country of origin appears on imported prepackaged fish. “Previously frozen” appears when a retailer thaws frozen fish for sale, and it is a useful signal rather than a warning. A farm name, region, or river system is a good sign when it shows up.
Use your eyes and nose. Colour even, with no brown edges or grey patches. Smell clean and mild, never sour or ammoniated. Flesh firm, springing back when pressed. How to tell if fish is fresh goes further.
For raw preparations, check the freezing history. Parasite destruction takes a specific freezing regime, not just a cold fridge. The requirements differ by jurisdiction, and some exempt certain farmed finfish raised on pelletized feed. If you cannot confirm it, cook it. What is sushi grade fish explains what the term does and does not guarantee.
How to cook salmon
Salmon is forgiving if you get two things right: a dry surface and a hot enough pan.
Pan-searing. Thick fillet, skin on. Heat the pan properly first. Pat the fish dry before it goes in, because a wet surface cannot brown. Sear skin-side down without moving it, then finish in the oven.
Grilling. A firmer species holds together best. Oil the grill and the fish, and preheat thoroughly.
Baking. Moderate heat around 175°C. Herbs, lemon, olive oil. Pull it when it just flakes.
Curing or smoking. Sockeye or coho carry the strongest flavour. Cure with salt and sugar, then hot smoke or cold cure with proper handling.
Raw. Only with a confirmed freezing history. Keep it cold, slice with a sharp knife.
For recipes, try maple mustard glazed salmon, air fryer salmon bowls, crispy dry brined salmon, or citrus chili cured salmon.
Questions people actually ask
Can I eat salmon raw? Only if it has been through a proper parasite-destruction freeze or holds an approved exemption, and you handle it cold and clean. If the seller cannot tell you, cook it.
What is the healthiest salmon? Fat content drives the omega-3 numbers, so chinook and farmed Atlantic generally deliver more EPA and DHA per serving than the leaner species. Exact values move with feed and season. Salmon health benefits has the detail.
How long does salmon keep in the freezer? Two to three months at minus eighteen for best quality. Vacuum packing buys more.
Is wild better than farmed? No, and the question is the problem. Both can be excellent. Both can be done badly. What matters is the specific operation, not the category. Wild versus farmed salmon takes it apart properly.
What should I drink with it? A fuller white like chardonnay or a light red like pinot noir suits richer preparations. A crisp sauvignon blanc works with leaner ones.
Choosing well
The useful conclusion of an ultimate guide to salmon is not a ranking. It is a shorter list of questions.
Which species, and does it suit what you are cooking. Wild or farmed, and if farmed, raised how. Frozen when, and how fast. Certified by whom, against what. Will the seller answer any of this without changing the subject.
None of that requires expertise. It requires knowing that the answers exist and that a vague label is a choice someone made. The market has been improving on this, slowly. Land-based farming has matured into a real alternative. Freezing technology has closed the quality gap that “fresh” used to trade on. And sourcing information is easier to find than it was five years ago.
If you want salmon that answers those questions before you ask, come and look at the market. And if you would rather just read something enjoyable about the fish, ten fun facts about salmon is the other end of the spectrum from this page.
