Name: Escalloped Salmon
Ingredients: 1 can of salmon; 1 cup cracker crumbs; ¼ teaspoon pepper; 2 tablespoons butter; ½ teaspoon coarse sea salt; 2 cups milk

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Escalloped Salmon

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

Remove oil, bones, and skin from the can of salmon and flake it with a fork.

Assemble and bake

Layer salmon in the bottom of a baking dish.
Cover with cracker crumbs, dot with pepper, butter, and salt.
Add more salmon and crumbs until the dish is filled.
Pour in 2 cups of milk and bake at 350°F (175°C) for 30 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.

Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Salmon + buttertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,481 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
Salmon + milktop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,577 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together85,593 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Pepper + milktop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together26,984 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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 provides its savory flavor.
Cracker crumbs: Absorb the milk and help the layers hold together as they bake.
Milk: Provides the liquid that moistens the layers and cooks into a soft, custardy binder.
Butter: Adds richness and fat, helping the top brown lightly in the oven.

“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.