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Creamed Salmon and Peas

A baked dish of salmon and peas in a white sauce topped with bread crumbs and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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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 ↓

Creamed Salmon and Peas

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Make the white sauce

  1. In a saucepan, make a white sauce by combining milk, cream, flour, butter, red pepper, salt, and parsley. Cook until thickened.

Assemble and bake

  1. In a buttered baking dish, layer salmon, a sprinkle of peas, and a layer of bread crumbs.

  2. Cover with the white sauce and repeat the layers until the dish is filled.

  3. Top with bread crumbs and melted butter.

  4. Bake until the top is brown.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  4. Salmon + peastop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together375 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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 body of the dish, giving it substance and a rich flavor.
Flour
Thickens the milk and cream into a smooth white sauce that holds the layers together.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the white sauce, adding moisture and creaminess.
Cream
Adds richness and body to the white sauce, giving a silkier texture.
Butter
Adds fat and flavor to the sauce and browns the bread-crumb topping.
Bread crumbs
Form layers and a crisp top that browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Cook the white sauce until thickened. Flour must be cooked in the hot liquid until it thickens fully; undercooked flour leaves a raw, pasty taste and a sauce that stays thin or grainy.

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, milk, cream, flour, butter, pepper, parsley):

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Pistachiofits better
  3. Walnutfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, milk, cream, flour, butter, pepper, parsley. 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.

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