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Salmon En Croquille

A baked salmon custard topped with buttered crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Salmon En Croquille

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.

Make the sauce

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  2. Add the flour, salt, and pepper, stirring to combine.

  3. Slowly add the milk and the liquor from the salmon, mixing well.

Assemble and bake

  1. Remove from heat and stir in the salmon, parsley, onion juice, lemon juice, and beaten egg yolks.

  2. Spoon the mixture into buttered shells and top with buttered crumbs.

  3. Bake at 350°F (175°C) until golden.

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. Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Salmon
Provides the main body and flavor of the filling.
Egg yolks
Thicken the mixture when gently heated and bind it together as it sets.
Flour
Thickens the butter and milk into a smooth white sauce.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the sauce that carries the filling.
Butter
Adds richness and carries flavor into the flour roux.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich sauce and salmon.

The step that matters

Stir the egg yolks in off the heat. Egg yolks thicken and can scramble if they get too hot. Removing the pan from heat before adding them lets them bind the mixture smoothly without curdling.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, flour, butter, milk, parsley, onion, lemon):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Dillfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, flour, butter, milk, parsley, onion, lemon. 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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