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Boiled Salmon. Lemon Sauce.

A whole salmon boiled in salted water, served with a butter and lemon juice sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Salmon and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,481 recipes. Both carry 2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, green. The science ↓

Boiled Salmon. Lemon Sauce.

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Poach the salmon

  1. Fill a large pot with water, add salt, and bring to a boil.

  2. Carefully add the salmon to the boiling water and cook for about 15‑20 minutes until done.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. In a small saucepan, melt the butter and squeeze in the juice of the lemon.

  2. Serve the salmon with the lemon sauce drizzled 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. Salmon + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,481 recipes

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

  2. Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Salmon + lemontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,918 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
Provides the main protein, which firms and turns opaque as its proteins set with heat.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel in the sauce.
Lemon
Adds acidity that brightens the rich butter and cuts through its fattiness.

The step that matters

Cooking the salmon until done. Salmon proteins set and tighten as they heat, so leaving it in boiling water too long pushes the flesh dry and firm. Check it at the low end of the time range and stop once the flesh flakes easily.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Coconutfits about as well
  3. Lemonthe original
  4. Mangofits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, butter. 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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