Easy Salmon Sweet Potato Cakes

Pan-seared and paired with sweet potato, fresh herbs and Dijon mustard, this easy recipe transforms canned salmon into a delicious and budget-friendly meal.

Many, many years ago on one of our first dates, I wanted to impress my now husband by making salmon cakes for dinner. I found a recipe online that used fresh salmon and while the final result was delicious, I definitely gave myself sticker shock purchasing the ingredients. After that I knew there had to be a better way to make salmon cakes that didn’t cause me to go into debt purchasing fresh fish. Enter: canned salmon and sweet potato!

These Salmon Sweet Potato Cakes are full of flavor but a fraction of the cost of recipes using fresh fish. This is also what I would consider a pantry meal because so many of the ingredients – including the canned salmon and sweet potato – are easy to keep on hand. The only ingredients you’ll need to buy fresh are the scallions and parsley.

The addition of sweet potato not only adds flavor, but also helps to stretch the canned salmon further. It’s also a great recipe to use up mashed sweet potato you might have leftover from another meal.

If you are looking to incorporate more fish into your diet, and are mindful of your budget, definitely give these Salmon Sweet Potato Cakes a try.

Salmon Sweet Potato Cakes Ingredients

• Canned Salmon: This recipe calls for two cans of boneless, skinless salmon. You can also use canned salmon with the bones and skin on if you want (it’s often cheaper), but I prefer the texture of the boneless, skinless variety in this dish.

• Sweet Potato: You’ll want to use cooked, mashed sweet potato for this recipe. I like to cook my sweet potatoes in the microwave just before making this recipe (see Tips section for details on how to do this), but you can also use leftover sweet potato from another dish if you have it on hand.

• Scallions and Parsley: These give the dish both flavor and freshness, without overpowering the salmon and sweet potato, which are the stars of the recipe.

• Dijon Mustard: I like to add a little Dijon mustard to the salmon cakes as it’s an easy way to add more flavor and also something I always have on hand in my pantry.

• Egg: Just one egg is necessary to help bind the salmon cakes together.

• Panko Breadcrumbs: I like to use some breadcrumbs to help the salmon cakes keep their shape, otherwise they have a tendency to fall apart while cooking. I’ve tested the dish with several varieties of breadcrumbs and prefer panko as I think they help absorb moisture in the dish, without imparting too much flavor.

Recipe Tips

As noted in the ingredients section, I like to cook my sweet potato in the microwave before making this recipe. It’s super simple to do. 

1. Clean your sweet potatoes and pierce them all over with a fork (this helps steam escape while cooking).
2. Place the sweet potatoes on a microwave safe plate and place them in the microwave.
3. If your microwave has a built-in “potato” function, you can use that. If not, cook the potatoes for 5 minutes. 
4. Check if the sweet potatoes are tender by piercing it with a paring knife. It should pass through completely and you shouldn’t feel any resistance. If it still feels a bit hard, continue cooking for 1 minute increments, testing again after each cooking interval.
5. Let the sweet potato completely cool before using it in this recipe. To help speed the process up I like to cut the sweet potatoes in half to help steam escape.
6. Once cool, you can use a spoon to scoop out the cooked sweet potato from the skins.

Recipe FAQS

Related Recipes

Looking to make this a complete meal? Try serving it with my Simple Sautéed Green Beans. I also love topping it with my Lemon Dill Yogurt Sauce.

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