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Salmon, Baked

Baked salmon slices served with a sauce of melted butter, cayenne, ketchup, port wine, anchovy, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Ketchup and anchovy match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 479 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Salmon, Baked

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Wash the salmon slices lightly in salted water and dry them with a cloth.

Make the sauce

  1. In a saucepan, mix melted butter, cayenne, ketchup, port, and anchovy.

  2. Heat the sauce over low heat until the anchovy dissolves, then strain it over the salmon.

Bake and serve

  1. Cover the dish and bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) for about 45 minutes.

  2. Serve the salmon hot with the sauce poured around it.

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. Ketchup + anchovytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together479 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Salmon + anchovytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together535 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Butter + port winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,499 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Butter + anchovytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,697 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Ketchup + port winetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together425 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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 and is cooked gently by the oven heat.
Melted butter
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavour and keeping the salmon moist.
Port wine
Adds sweetness and depth to the sauce as it reduces slightly with heat.
Anchovy
Dissolves into the sauce, adding savoury depth without a distinct fishy taste.
Ketchup
Adds sweetness and acidity to balance the rich butter and port sauce.

The step that matters

Heating the sauce until the anchovy dissolves. Gentle heat over low flame lets the anchovy melt fully into the butter without scorching the butter or port, which would turn the sauce bitter and separate it.

“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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