Name: Salmon with Red Wine
Ingredients: 1 large fresh salmon; salt; pepper; flour; ½ cup red wine; 4 mushrooms, chopped; 2 tablespoons butter; 2 tablespoons fish stock

Why it works: Mushroom and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 12,525 recipes. Both carry trans-2-decenal, which smells waxy, orange. The science ↓

Salmon with Red Wine

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the salmon

Cut the salmon into 1‑inch thick slices.
Season the salmon slices with a pinch of salt and pepper.
Roll the seasoned slices in flour.

Bag and cook

Place the slices in a bag.
Add red wine, chopped mushrooms, butter, and fish stock to the bag. Close the bag.
Cook the bagged salmon for 35 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.

Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together12,525 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
Red wine + mushroomtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together720 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-methylphenol (smoky, clove).
Salmon + fishtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,078 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together13,580 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Butter + fishtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,488 recipes

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

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 dish and cooks through gently inside the bag.
Flour: Coats the salmon slices, helping them brown lightly and giving the wine sauce some body.
Red wine: Adds acidity and depth, flavouring the juices that form in the bag.
Mushrooms: Release moisture and savoury flavour into the sauce as they cook.
Butter: Adds richness and fat, rounding out the wine and fish flavours.

“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.