This easy recipe for salmon burgers uses seafood, spices and some crushed potato chips to create a healthy and delicious burger alternative to ground beef. They are great topped with tartar sauce and on a roll, or pop them on some greens for a salmon burger salad!

I do love a good burger (especially those thin but juicy diner-style burgers where you can have two layers of burger!) but as you know I also like to mess with traditional recipes, and recently I did that with crab cakes by making crab cake burgers.
Not a huge stretch because crab cakes are burger-shaped anyway.
However, those crab cake burgers were so scrumptious that it had me pondering how I could get some other seafood burgers on our menu, and since the Southern husband and I are big old salmon lovers, that seemed like a natural.
A nice hunk of salmon filet, chopped up and mixed with some herbs and spices and capers and my secret crab cake ingredient…are you ready?
Crushed potato chips. More specifically, crushed thin potato chips, like Wise or Lay’s.
Since you only need a half cup for four salmon burgers, this has the added benefit of having the rest of the bag of chips available to snack on while you are cooking.
Not that I would ever do that. HA.
I’m seriously trying not to at the current moment, because this week my daffodils are dramatically reminding me that bathing suit weather is right around the corner.
Aren’t they the prettiest things?
So let’s make some good and good for you salmon burgers!
How do you make salmon burgers from scratch?
You want about a pound of boneless salmon filet. Slice off the skin, cut it into chunks, and process about 3/4 of those chunks in your food processor until you have a pile of finely chopped salmon.
Now drop in the rest of the salmon and pulse it a few times until they are about pea-sized chunks. This will give you some larger bits of salmon in your burger. YUM.
Next, mix up that salmon with some mustard, chopped scallions, capers, Old Bay seasoning, pepper and those crushed potato chips.
Salmon is a moist fish, and all that healthy salmon oil is going to hold things together while you form the mixture into four lovely salmon burger shapes.
Now! Heat a little butter and oil on a griddle or in a large skillet (I do love my griddle for things like this) and lovingly lay those patties down.
Cook them for 2-3 minutes per side, carefully turning them over, until they are nice and golden.
We like to top ours with a little tartar sauce (and a sprinkle of potato chips) and a squeeze of lemon.
What Should I Serve With Salmon Burgers?
Since these are totally legit burgers, you can of course have them on burger rolls (the Southern husband will always and forever love King’s Hawaiian Rolls for this) but the day I made this particular batch we were feeling like salad, so we had our salmon burgers on a bed of leafy greens.
We did NOT forego the potato chip sprinkle, though.
We have our limits.
So please help me welcome healthy, good and good for you salmon to the ranks of delicious burger recipes – yay, salmon!
- OTHER SALMON RECIPES WE JUST LOVE!
- Roasted Salmon Grain Bowl. Dinners in a bowl are the best kinds.
- Salmon in Buttered White Wine Sauce. Very ooh-la-la (and easy!)
- Flaked Salmon with Sesame Noodles. Because, noodles.
Salmon Burgers
This easy recipe for salmon burgers uses seafood, spices and some crushed potato chips to create a healthy and delicious burger alternative to ground beef. They are great topped with tartar sauce and on a roll, or pop them on some greens for a salmon burger salad!
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 6 minutes
- Total Time: 16 minutes
- Yield: 4 1x
- Category: Dinner
- Method: Stovetop
- Cuisine: American
Ingredients
- 1 pound boneless salmon filet, skin sliced off
- 2 teaspoons grainy mustard
- 2 scallions, chopped
- 1 tablespoon capers
- 1 teaspoon Old Bay seasoning
- 1/2 teaspoon pepper
- 1/2 cup crushed potato chips, plus extra for garnish
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
Instructions
- Slice the salmon into roughly 2-3 inch uniform chunks. Put 3/4 of the salmon in your food processor and process until very finely chopped.
- Add the rest of the salmon to the food processor and pulse it 2 to 3 times until the newly added salmon is cut into small chunks, about the size of peas.
- Transfer the salmon mixture to a bowl and stir in the mustard, scallions, capers, Old Bay and pepper. Gently stir in the crushed potato chips.
- Form the salmon mixture into patties.
- Put the butter and olive oil on to a griddle or into a large skillet over medium high heat. When the butter is melted, place the patties carefully onto the griddle or skillet and cook for 2-3 minutes per side.
- Serve on hamburger rolls or on a bed of lettuce, with lemon wedges and tartar sauce on the side. Sprinkle crushed potato chips on top.
Equipment We Used to Make This Recipe
Notes
Need to add something to your kitchen equipment to make this recipe? Below are some of the items we used in the Framed Cooks kitchen to help cook this up. These are affiliate links to things we use and love, which helps to pay for all that bacon I keep buying!
Keywords: salmon burgers, salmon burger recipe, easy salmon burger recipe, summer seafood recipe
Updated (and made even more delicious!) from a previously published Framed Cooks post!
Martha in KS says
Coincidence that you use potato chips in the salmon burgers. Recently I was making meatloaf & used the last of a bag of potato chips as a binder instead of bread. I use canned salmon when I make salmon patties, but next time I’ll use chips. Great minds!
★★★★★
Great minds is right! And now of course I need to put some potato chips in my meatloaf so the circle is complete. :)