Why it works: Salmon and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,481 recipes. Both carry 2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, green. The science ↓
To Roast Salmon
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Scale the salmon.
Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Roast
Tie the salmon to a spit or place it in a Dutch oven.
Roast the salmon, basting it with butter regularly until cooked through.
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.
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Salmon + buttertop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,481 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
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 the protein that sets as it cooks.
- Butter
- Adds moisture and richness to the surface, helping the fish stay tender and browning evenly.
The step that matters
Basting the salmon regularly. Salmon is lean and can dry out quickly. Spooning melted butter over it during roasting adds moisture to the surface and helps it stay tender until the flesh is just cooked through.
“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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