Why it works: Salmon and anchovy work together. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 535 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓
Salmon Cutlets
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Season the salmon slices with coarse sea salt and black pepper.
Butter a sheet of white paper and place each slice on a separate piece, twisting the ends.
For extra flavor, add chopped herbs and a little spice.
Cook and serve
Boil gently over a clear fire until cooked through.
Serve with anchovy or caper sauce.
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.
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Salmon + anchovytop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together535 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Butter + anchovytop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,697 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Salmon + buttertop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,481 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
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Pepper + anchovytop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,232 recipes
Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
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Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together85,593 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Salmon slices
- Forms the main body of the dish, cooking to a flaky, tender texture.
- Butter
- Adds richness and moisture, and keeps the paper from sticking to the fish.
The step that matters
Boil gently until cooked through. Boiling too hard or too long can toughen and dry the salmon. A gentle heat cooks the fish evenly while keeping it moist and tender.
“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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