Gravlax at home

BB, there are no worries here. When it is served, gravlax is skinless. I have always had great luck wth martha Stewart's recipe in Entertaining, and it calls for the salt/sugar/herb and spice mixture to be applied to the top of 2 matching skin- on filets which are then sandwiched together. After they have been weighted and cured a few days, she rinses them and slices the filet off the skin and then slices the gravlax for service. The skin is discarded (it has not been cured so you wouldn't eat it.)

It's fine if your filets are skinless already.I don't know if they might cure a bit faster than with the skin on, because there would be no skin to stop the cure from travelling out the other side of the filet, but all you have to do is rinse an end and take a small slice and taste- to check if it's ready earlier than predicted. And as eliz. says, health risk is not an issue here.

I don't see why lack of skin would present a health risk. Recommendations for preparing gravlax with skin-on fillet most likely concern flavor; the skin also prevents the salmon from flaking as it cures. (While I rarely buy salmon, I always look for skin-on wild salmon from Alaska. The skin crisps up like the best part of a roasted chicken when fillets are pan-seared and loaded with Omega-3 fatty acids, it's highly nutritious!) Also see recipe for gravlax by Marcus Samuelsson. Very easy and delicious.