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Salmon Timbale

A baked salmon dish shaped in a mold with parsley, lemon, cream, and eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 Timbale

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 salmon

  1. Remove the skin, bones, and oil from the salmon if using canned salmon.

  2. Flake the fish with a fork until very fine.

Make the mixture

  1. Add parsley, lemon juice, salt, and pepper; mix well.

  2. Stir in thick cream and beaten eggs until combined.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into well-buttered timbale molds.

  2. Place the molds in a pan of boiling water.

  3. Cook gently in the oven at 350°F (175°C) for 20 minutes.

  4. Turn out from the molds and serve with cream or mushroom sauce.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

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

  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

Eggs
Set the mixture into a firm, sliceable custard that holds the timbale's shape.
Salmon
Provides the main protein body and flavor of the timbale.
Thick cream
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the custard tender rather than dry.

The step that matters

Cooking gently in a water bath. Egg custards turn grainy, spongy, or watery when cooked too hot. Setting the molds in boiling water and baking gently moderates the heat so the eggs coagulate evenly and smoothly.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Dillfits about as well
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Tarragonfits about as well
  4. Nutmegfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, lemon, pepper, 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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