Why it works: Fish and oyster work together. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 496 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
Salmon, Baked
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the fish
If using a small fish, turn the tail to the mouth and skewer it. For large fish, cut into slices.
Fill the belly with force-meat if desired. Egg the fish and dip it in the force-meat.
Place bits of butter around the fish. Optionally, add oysters.
Bake and serve
Baste the fish occasionally with butter.
When one side is brown, carefully turn it. When the second side is brown, it is done.
Remove the fish with all the contents from the baking dish.
For sauce, mix melted butter with port wine, ketchup, and lemon juice, and pour over the fish.
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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Fish + oystertop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together496 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Fish + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,488 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Butter + oystertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,184 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
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Butter + port winetop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,499 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
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Fish + lemontop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1,889 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Butter
- Adds fat and moisture, and browns the fish as it bastes the surface.
- Port wine
- Adds sweetness and depth of flavour to the sauce.
- Lemon juice
- Adds acidity that brightens the rich butter and sauce.
- Ketchup
- Adds sweet and tangy flavour to the sauce.
The step that matters
Turning the fish. Turn the fish only once the first side is well browned, so it holds its shape and does not break or stick. Basting during baking keeps the surface moist so it browns evenly without drying out.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, butter, oyster, port wine, ketchup):
- Lemonthe original
- Applefits about as well
- Currantfits less well
- Grapefits less well
Fit is the average pairing score against fish, butter, oyster, port wine, ketchup. 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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