Name: Salmon Loaf
Ingredients: 1 cup fresh or canned salmon; ½ cup canned milk; 1 teaspoon lemon juice; ½ cup stale bread crumbs; ½ teaspoon onion juice; 1 beaten egg; Salt and pepper to taste

Why it works: Lemon and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Salmon Loaf

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Mix and bake

Mix the salmon, milk, lemon juice, bread crumbs, onion juice, beaten egg, salt, and pepper together.
Transfer the mixture to a buttered baking dish or custard cups.
Bake for about 20 minutes.

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.

Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together27,047 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together11,466 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together68,474 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together22,662 recipes

Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together19,053 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg: Binds the salmon and crumbs together and helps the loaf set as it bakes.
Bread crumbs: Absorb liquid and add body, giving the loaf a softer, more tender texture.
Canned milk: Adds moisture and richness, keeping the loaf tender rather than dry.
Salmon: Provides the main body and flavor of the loaf.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, milk, lemon, bread, egg, pepper):

Asparagusfits better
Capsicumfits better
Spinachfits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, milk, lemon, bread, egg, pepper. 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.