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Salmon, with Caper Sauce

Salmon marinated with oil, salt, pepper, parsley, chives, shallots, then broiled and served with caper sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Chive and shallot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 450 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-ol, which smells mushroom, earthy. The science ↓

Salmon, with Caper Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Marinate

  1. Marinate the salmon slices in oil, salt, pepper, parsley, chives, and shallots for 5 to 6 hours.

  2. Wrap the marinated salmon in paper with the marinade.

Cook and serve

  1. Broil the wrapped salmon until cooked through.

  2. Remove from paper and serve with caper sauce.

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. Chive + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  2. Parsley + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Parsley + chivetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Pepper + chivetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,885 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Salmon
Provides the main protein, which sets and firms as it cooks through.
Oil
Carries the herbs and shallots and keeps the salmon moist during cooking.
Shallots
Add a mild onion-like sharpness that flavours the salmon during marinating.
Capers
Add briny, acidic bite that contrasts with the rich fish in the sauce.

The step that matters

Broil the wrapped salmon until cooked through. Salmon dries out quickly once it passes doneness, and the flesh turns from translucent to opaque as proteins set. Checking for opacity at the thickest point helps avoid overcooking while ensuring the fish is fully cooked.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, pepper, chive, shallot, sauce):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Parsleythe original
  4. Dillfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, pepper, chive, shallot, 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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