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Boiled Salmon

A whole salmon is seasoned, wrapped, boiled, and served with butter or fish sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Boiled Salmon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Rub a little coarse sea salt into the fish.

  2. Flour a cloth and wrap the fish in it.

Cook and serve

  1. Place the wrapped fish in boiling water.

  2. Cook for 10 minutes per pound after the water returns to a boil.

  3. Serve with drawn butter or fish sauce.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Salmon + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  3. Salmon + flourtop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,776 recipes

    Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).

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
Its protein firms and turns opaque as it cooks, giving the flesh a flaky, set texture.
Drawn butter
Adds fat and richness to the mild fish when served.

The step that matters

Timing after the water returns to a boil. Salmon proteins tighten as they heat, and overcooking squeezes out moisture, leaving the flesh dry and tough. Start timing only once the water is boiling again.

“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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