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Saumon Au Bleu, or Court Bouillon

A salmon cooked in wine and aromatics, served with a reduced wine sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Saumon Au Bleu, or Court Bouillon

Ingredients

Directions

Poach

  1. Place the cleaned salmon in a fish kettle.

  2. Pour in the wine and add salt, pepper, onion, garlic, cloves, thyme, bay leaf, parsley, and butter.

  3. Heat the kettle over high heat until the wine ignites, then let it reduce by half.

Serve

  1. Remove the fish, drain it, and serve on an oblong dish covered with a napkin.

  2. Serve oil and vinegar in a sauceboat alongside.

  3. Reuse the bouillon by adding more vinegar.

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. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together29,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

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

  4. Clove + thymetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,108 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Pepper + thymetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Salmon
Main protein that firms and turns opaque and flaky as it cooks in the hot liquid.
Wine
Adds acidity and flavor to the cooking liquid, which concentrates as it reduces.
Onion
Releases sweetness and aroma into the cooking liquid as it softens.
Garlic
Adds pungent aroma that mellows during gentle heating.
Butter
Adds fat and richness to the cooking liquid and the fish.
Thyme
Adds herbal aroma that infuses into the cooking liquid.

The step that matters

Heating until the wine ignites, then reducing by half. Reducing concentrates the wine and aromatics into a more intense liquid. Heating too long or too hot can overcook the fish and drive off delicate flavors, so watch the reduction closely.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, wine, pepper, onion, garlic, thyme, parsley):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Rosemaryfits better
  3. Oreganofits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, wine, pepper, onion, garlic, thyme, 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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