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Frejli Salmon

Salmon fillets broiled and served with a sauce of anchovies, leek, capers, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Leek and capers share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Frejli Salmon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the salmon

  1. Cut the salmon into pieces. Wipe the salmon pieces clean and dry.

  2. Melt butter in a pan. Add flour to the melted butter. Add coarse sea salt.

  3. Coat the salmon pieces in the butter mixture.

Broil the salmon

  1. Place the salmon on a clean grill.

  2. Broil the salmon over a low fire. Turn the salmon to cook evenly until done.

Make the anchovy sauce

  1. Wash and bone the anchovies. Cut the anchovies into small pieces.

  2. Cut the leek into three or four long pieces.

  3. Melt butter in a saucepan. Add flour to the melted butter.

  4. Add anchovies to the mixture. Add leek to the mixture. Add capers to the mixture. Add pepper to the mixture. Add nutmeg to the mixture.

  5. Add warm water and vinegar to the saucepan. Shake the saucepan until it boils. Simmer the sauce until ready.

  6. Remove the leek from the sauce.

Serve

  1. Pour the sauce into a dish.

  2. Place the broiled salmon on top of the sauce.

  3. Garnish with quartered lemons.

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. Leek + caperstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Flour + caperstop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,024 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Leek + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together152 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Capers + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together211 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Fresh salmon
Forms the main body of the dish and carries the flavor of the sauce.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that helps coat the salmon and carry flavor.
Flour
Thickens the butter and the sauce, giving them body and a smoother texture.
Anchovies
Provide a deep, savory saltiness that melts into the sauce.
Capers
Add a sharp, briny acidity that cuts through the rich butter.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the sauce and balances its richness.

The step that matters

Simmer the sauce until ready. Flour thickens only when the mixture is heated and simmered long enough, so undercooking leaves the sauce thin and pasty-tasting. Boiling hard or too long can scorch the butter and break the sauce.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, butter, flour, leek, capers, pepper, vinegar):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, butter, flour, leek, capers, pepper, vinegar. 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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