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Salmon and Fried Smelts

A dish of salmon served with fried smelts, seasoned with salt and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Salmon and smelt work together. They rank in the top 20% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 67 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Salmon and Fried Smelts

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare and fry

  1. Season the salmon and smelts with salt and pepper.

  2. Heat oil in a frying pan over medium heat.

  3. Fry the smelts until golden brown, about 3-4 minutes per side.

  4. Remove the smelts and keep warm.

Cook and serve

  1. In the same pan, cook the salmon until it flakes easily with a fork, about 5-7 minutes per side.

  2. Serve the salmon with the fried smelts.

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. Salmon + smelttop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together67 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Salmon + peppertop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,446 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Smelt + peppertop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together175 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Salmon
Forms the main flesh of the dish, flaking when cooked through.
Smelts
Small whole fish that brown in the hot oil, adding crisp texture and a rich flavor.

The step that matters

Frying the smelts until golden brown. Smelts are small and thin, so they cook fast and can burn or dry out if the oil is too hot. Medium heat lets them brown evenly and cook through with a crisp exterior and moist interior.

“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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