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Boiled Salmon

A boiled salmon served with a butter, egg, and parsley mixture.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and parsley are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 28,563 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Boiled Salmon

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the salmon

  1. Wrap the fresh salmon in a napkin.

  2. Boil the salmon for 30 minutes.

Make the topping and serve

  1. In a bowl, mix the drawn butter with the chopped hard boiled eggs and parsley.

  2. Serve the salmon with the butter mixture on top.

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. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Salmon + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Egg + parsleytop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,765 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Fresh salmon
Forms the main body of the dish; gentle boiling keeps its flesh moist and flaky.
Drawn butter
Adds moisture and richness, coating the salmon and the topping.
Hard boiled eggs
Add soft, crumbly texture and richness to the butter topping.
Parsley
Adds fresh, herbal aroma and a bright flavor to the butter.

The step that matters

Boil the salmon for 30 minutes. Salmon proteins tighten and dry out when overcooked, so timing matters. Holding the fish at a gentle simmer for the stated time helps it stay moist and flaky rather than tough.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, butter, egg):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Nutmegfits about as well
  4. Dillfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, butter, egg. 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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