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Dried or Kippered Salmon

A method of curing salmon by pickling with salt and sugar, then drying or smoking.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Salmon and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 27% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,446 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Dried or Kippered Salmon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Clean and scale the salmon without washing it.

  2. Split the fish and remove the bone.

Cure

  1. Pickle the salmon for 2-3 days with equal parts salt and sugar, adding a little black pepper and saltpetre.

  2. Press the fish down well during pickling.

Stretch and dry

  1. Once cured, stretch each fish with a piece of slick.

  2. Dry the salmon using smoke or another method.

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. Salmon + peppertop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,446 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Sugar + peppertop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,401 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Salmon + sugartop 35% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together931 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,401 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
Is the main body of the dish, which is split, cured, and dried.
Salt
Draws out moisture and seasons the fish during the cure.
Sugar
Balances the salt and adds mild sweetness to the cured flesh.

The step that matters

Press the fish down well during pickling. Pressing keeps the fish flesh in firm, even contact with the salt and sugar mixture, so the cure penetrates evenly and the fish doesn't spoil or cure unevenly.

“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.

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