Skip to main content
Main

Salmon Loaf

A steamed loaf made from salmon, eggs, butter, breadcrumbs, and a corn starch‑thickened milk sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Salmon Loaf

Ingredients

Directions

Make the loaf

  1. Chop the salmon finely and mix it with the beaten eggs, melted butter, bread crumbs, salt, pepper, and parsley.

  2. Transfer the mixture to a buttered pan and steam for 1 hour.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. Heat the milk to boiling point and thicken it with corn starch and butter.

  2. Add the liquor from the salmon and the raw egg last, mixing carefully.

  3. Pour the sauce over the loaf and serve hot.

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.

  1. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Milk + corntop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  5. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the salmon mixture and help it set into a firm loaf when steamed.
Bread crumbs
Absorb liquid and add body so the loaf holds together and stays tender.
Corn starch
Thickens the milk into a smooth sauce as it heats.
Milk
Forms the base of the sauce, giving it a creamy texture once thickened.
Salmon
Provides the main protein and flavor, setting into the loaf as it cooks.

The step that matters

Adding the raw egg to the sauce. Raw egg can scramble or curdle if it meets very hot liquid too quickly. Adding it last, off the heat and mixing gently, keeps the sauce smooth.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, egg, butter, bread, pepper, milk, corn):

  1. Nutmegfits about as well
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Cinnamonfits about as well
  4. Dillfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, egg, butter, bread, pepper, milk, corn. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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.

More salmon loaf recipes

Sauce 5Steamed 4 See all 140 →

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesCorn FrittersCorn Fritters203 recipesSalmon SaladSalmon Salad155 recipesSalmon CroquettesSalmon Croquettes129 recipes