Skip to main content
Main

Salmon Cutlets Aux Concombres

Baked salmon cutlets served with a cucumber accompaniment.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Thyme and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Salmon Cutlets Aux Concombres

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 the salmon

  1. Remove the bones and skin from the salmon slice.

  2. Cut the salmon into ½‑inch thick slices and flatten each with a wet rolling pin.

  3. Cut uniform‑shaped cutlets from the flattened slices.

Bake the cutlets

  1. Place the cutlets on a well‑buttered baking tin and sprinkle with salt and pepper.

  2. Cover with buttered white paper and bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 10 minutes.

Make the sauce

  1. In a saucepan, combine salmon trimmings, carrots, onions, thyme, parsley, bay leaf, cloves, whole pepper, and stock.

  2. Boil gently until reduced by half, then strain and remove any fat.

  3. Melt butter in a pan, add flour, and stir until well colored.

  4. Add the strained liquid to the butter‑flour mixture and stir until the sauce boils.

Prepare the cucumber

  1. Cut the cucumber into 1‑inch rounds, quarter each round, and remove seeds and rind.

  2. Boil the cucumber pieces in salted water until nearly tender.

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. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Carrot + thymetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Pepper + thymetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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 of the cutlets and gives the dish its flavor and texture.
Flour
Thickens the butter and stock into a smooth sauce as it cooks.
Butter
Adds richness and carries flavor, and with flour forms the base of the sauce.
Stock
Provides the liquid base of the sauce, flavored by the salmon trimmings and aromatics.
Cucumber
Adds a cool, fresh contrast to the rich salmon and sauce.

The step that matters

Boil the sauce gently until reduced by half. Gentle boiling concentrates the stock and extracts flavor from the trimmings without making the liquid cloudy or greasy. Removing fat after reduction keeps the sauce clean and smooth.

Swap the cucumber

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, pepper, butter, carrot, onion, thyme, parsley):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Parsnipfits better
  4. Cucumberthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, pepper, butter, carrot, onion, thyme, 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.

You might also like

Salmon SaladSalmon Salad155 recipesCarrot SoupCarrot Soup134 recipesSalmon CroquettesSalmon Croquettes129 recipesCanned SalmonCanned Salmon14 recipes