Name: Broiled Salmon
Ingredients: 1 salmon fillet, cut into 1-inch thick slices; pepper; coarse sea salt; butter; anchovy sauce

Why it works: Anchovy and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,057 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Broiled Salmon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Season the salmon slices with pepper and coarse sea salt.
Lay each slice on a half sheet of well-buttered white paper.
Twist the ends of the paper to seal.

Cook and serve

Broil the slices over a slow fire for 6 to 8 minutes.
Serve the salmon in the paper with anchovy sauce.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

Anchovy + saucetop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,057 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Salmon + anchovytop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together535 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Butter + anchovytop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,697 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together15,338 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Salmon + buttertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,481 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Salmon: Forms the main protein that cooks through gently inside the sealed paper.
Butter: Adds fat and moisture to the paper, helping keep the fish tender while it cooks.
Anchovy sauce: Adds a salty, savory flavor to the finished fish.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.