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Steamed Salmon with Turkish Pilau

Steamed salmon served over tomato‑flavored rice pilaf.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Steamed Salmon with Turkish Pilau

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the salmon

  1. Rub the salmon with salt.

  2. Steam the salmon until tender, about 30 minutes.

Make the pilaf

  1. Cook the rice in the stock until all is absorbed.

  2. Add the strained tomato to the rice.

  3. Season the rice with salt while cooking and add pepper with the tomato.

Serve

  1. Transfer the salmon to a serving platter.

  2. Heap the rice around the salmon and garnish with 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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Rice + tomatotop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,065 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Tomato + parsleytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,398 recipes

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

  5. Rice + parsleytop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,762 recipes

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

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, becoming tender and flaky when gently steamed.
Rice
Absorbs the stock and tomato, forming the soft, flavoured base of the pilaf.
Stock
Cooks the rice and carries flavour into each grain as it is absorbed.
Strained tomato
Adds moisture, acidity and colour to the rice.

The step that matters

Steam the salmon until tender. Salmon turns dry and firm when overcooked, because proteins tighten and squeeze out moisture. Gentle steam heat cooks it evenly, so it stays moist and flakes easily.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, rice, tomato, pepper):

  1. Corianderfits better
  2. Turmericfits better
  3. Basilfits about as well
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, rice, tomato, pepper. 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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