Skip to main content
Main

Salmon Soap

A salmon soup made with onion, milk, flour, paprika, and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Onion and parsley are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 25,843 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Salmon Soap

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Clean, wash, and dry the salmon, then cut it into 2-inch cubes.

  2. Gently mix the diced onion with the fish and sprinkle salt over all.

  3. Let the mixture stand in a cold place for about 3 hours.

Cook and serve

  1. Put the fish mixture into a stewpan and cover with boiling water.

  2. Boil for about 7 minutes, then add the milk.

  3. When it comes to a boil again, stir in the flour mixed with a little milk.

  4. Add paprika and serve garnished with chopped parsley.

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. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Flour + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Salmon + milktop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,577 recipes

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

  5. Onion + flourtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together32,460 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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
Provides the main body and flavour of the soup as the fish cooks in the broth.
Milk
Adds creaminess and a mild sweetness to the soup's liquid.
Flour
Thickens the milk-based liquid as it comes to a boil, giving the soup body.
Onion
Adds savoury aroma and sweetness as it sits with the fish and cooks.

The step that matters

Stirring in the flour mixture. Flour mixed with a little milk first disperses evenly; added directly it clumps. Once the liquid reaches a boil again, the starch swells and thickens the soup, so it should be stirred in while the liquid is simmering.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, onion, milk, flour):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Jalapenofits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, onion, milk, flour. 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.

You might also like

Salmon SaladSalmon Salad155 recipesSalmon CroquettesSalmon Croquettes129 recipesCanned SalmonCanned Salmon14 recipesSmoked SalmonSmoked Salmon14 recipes