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Boiled Salmon

A simple boiled salmon served with a cream and egg sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Salmon and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,401 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Boiled Salmon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the salmon thoroughly.

  2. Rub coarse sea salt into the salmon.

  3. Wrap the salmon in a floured cloth.

Cook and serve

  1. Place the wrapped salmon in boiling water.

  2. Boil for 30 minutes.

  3. Serve with a sauce made of cream and eggs.

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. Salmon + creamtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,401 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  2. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Salmon + eggtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,485 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Flour + creamtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

  5. Cream + eggtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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
Is the main protein, cooked gently in boiling water until flaky.
Flour
Forms a cloth wrapping that shields the fish from direct contact with the water.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture to the sauce served with the fish.
Eggs
Thicken the cream sauce as they set with gentle heat.

The step that matters

Boil for 30 minutes. Boiling at too high a heat or for too long can make the salmon dry and tough, since proteins contract and squeeze out moisture. Keep the water at a steady, gentle boil so the fish cooks through evenly.

“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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