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Boiled Salmon

A whole salmon boiled in water, served with egg sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Salmon and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,485 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Boiled Salmon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Scale the salmon.

  2. Place the salmon in a wire basket.

  3. Plunge the basket into boiling water.

Cook

  1. Let the salmon simmer until done, about 1 hour.

  2. Drain the salmon well.

Serve

  1. Place the salmon on a platter.

  2. Pour egg sauce over the salmon.

  3. Serve the sauce in a sauce boat.

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  2. Salmon + saucetop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,765 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Egg + saucetop 39% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10,895 recipes

Egg and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 10,895 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
Forms the main body of the dish, cooking to a firm, flaky texture.
Egg sauce
Adds richness and moisture to the cooked fish as a serving sauce.

The step that matters

Let the salmon simmer until done. Simmering gently keeps the flesh moist and tender. Cooking too hard or too long can toughen the proteins and dry the fish, so check that it flakes easily before draining.

“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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