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Salmon Scallops

Salmon scallops are thin slices of salmon sautéed in butter, seasoned with pepper, sea salt, parsley, and nutmeg, served in stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Salmon Scallops

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the salmon

  1. Cut the salmon into small thin slices and remove all skin.

  2. Cut the slices into rounds and flatten them with a knife dipped in cold water.

Cook the salmon

  1. Melt the butter in a stewpan.

  2. Place the scallops side by side in the melted butter.

  3. Sprinkle pepper and coarse sea salt over the scallops.

  4. When they are browned, turn them over.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. Heat the stock in a saucepan.

  2. Add the butter the fish was cooked in to the stock.

  3. Stir in the minced parsley and nutmeg, then serve with the fish.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  4. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Butter + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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, cooking to a firm, flaky texture once browned.
Butter
Cooks the fish gently and adds richness and browning, then enriches the sauce.
Stock
Forms the liquid base of the sauce that the cooking butter is added to.

The step that matters

Turning the scallops once browned. Salmon slices are thin and can overcook quickly. Turning them only when the underside is browned gives an even crust and keeps the flesh moist inside.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, butter, pepper, parsley):

  1. Dillfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, butter, pepper, parsley. 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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