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Salmon Tn a Mould

A steamed salmon mixture baked in a mold served with a creamy sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 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 ↓

Salmon Tn a Mould

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the salmon mixture

  1. Chop the salmon finely and mix with melted butter until smooth.

  2. In a bowl, combine the beaten eggs and bread crumbs, and season with pepper, salt, and minced parsley.

  3. Add the salmon mixture to the egg mixture and combine well.

Steam

  1. Transfer the mixture to a buttered mold and steam for one hour.

Make the sauce

  1. For the sauce, heat the milk in a saucepan.

  2. Thicken the milk with cornstarch mixed with a little cold water and add the butter.

  3. Stir in the salmon liquor, then add the raw egg, tomato ketchup, mace, and cayenne, mixing carefully.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  4. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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 and flavour of the loaf.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and set when steamed, giving the loaf structure.
Bread crumbs
Absorb liquid and add body so the loaf holds together.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the loaf.
Milk
Forms the base of the sauce, providing body and creaminess.
Cornstarch
Thickens the milk into a smooth, pourable sauce.

The step that matters

Stirring in the raw egg for the sauce. Egg proteins set at roughly 65 to 70°C, so adding raw egg to a hot sauce can scramble or curdle it. Mixing gently and thoroughly keeps the sauce smooth and evenly combined.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, egg, butter, bread, pepper, milk, sauce):

  1. Capersfits about as well
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Parsleythe original
  4. Tarragonfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, egg, butter, bread, pepper, milk, sauce. 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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