Name: To Grill Fresh Salmon Steaks or Cutlets
Ingredients: Fresh salmon; Flour (optional); Chalk (for rubbing the gridiron); Anchovy or shrimp sauce (for serving)

Why it works: Salmon and anchovy work together. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 535 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

To Grill Fresh Salmon Steaks or Cutlets

Ingredients

Fresh salmon
Flour (optional)
Chalk (for rubbing the gridiron)
Anchovy or shrimp sauce (for serving)

Directions

Split the salmon and remove the bone carefully.
Cut fillets 2 to 3 inches wide.
Dry the fillets with a cloth without pressing them.
Prepare a clear fire and rub a bright-barred gridiron with chalk to prevent sticking.
If the fillets are not completely dry, dust them lightly with flour.
Place the gridiron at an angle to allow oil to drain off.
Grill the salmon until cooked, turning with steak tongs.
Serve immediately, optionally covering with a hot napkin.

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.

Salmon + anchovytop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together535 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Flour + anchovytop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,753 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Salmon + flourtop 27% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,776 recipes

Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).