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Salmon Pie

Salmon pie is a baked dish of boiled salmon mixed with mashed potatoes, butter, cream, and salt, topped with egg yolk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Salmon Pie

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 the filling

  1. Boil the salmon until cooked, then remove the bones and mash it finely.

  2. Mix in the mashed potatoes, butter, cream, and salt until well combined.

Bake and serve

  1. Fill a pie dish with the mixture and brush the top with the egg yolk.

  2. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for one hour.

  3. Serve with egg sauce or diced lemon.

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 + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Salmon + creamtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,401 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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 filling and provides its flavor.
Mashed potatoes
Add bulk and a soft, creamy texture to the filling.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth mouthfeel.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the filling tender when baked.
Egg yolk
Brushed on top to promote golden browning during baking.

The step that matters

Mixing the filling until well combined. Thoroughly blending the salmon, potatoes, butter, and cream spreads fat and moisture evenly, so the filling bakes uniformly and does not turn dry or patchy in spots.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Chivefits about as well
  2. Asparagusfits about as well
  3. Leekfits about as well
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, butter, cream, 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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