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Home-cured Beetroot Gravadlax

This recipe may sound like a lot of work, but curing your own salmon is much easier than you think. You do need to plan ahead, as the flavours need about two days to sink into the salmon properly, but it's worth the wait. You'll only spend about 20 minutes doing the actual curing, and you'll end up with a delicate pink gravadlax which tastes impressive. Although curing is easy, it is important to follow the measurements, so try to get a side of salmon as close as possible to the weight I've suggested here.

By jamieoliver · From Open Recipes · 16 ingredients
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Home-cured Beetroot Gravadlax

Why it works: Beetroot and tarragon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 184 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Home-cured Beetroot Gravadlax

Serves 6

Ingredients

Directions

Step-by-step directions aren't available for this recipe. See the full recipe at the source →

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

796Calories
36 gProtein
15 gFat
128 gCarbs

Counts 9 of 12 ingredients. The other 3 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 9 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Salmon100g cooked208
Orange1 medium (131g)62
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12
Dill5 sprigs fresh (1g) / 1 tsp dried4
Watercress1 cup (34g)4
Tarragon1 tsp dried (0.5g)2
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Beetrootnot in our table0
Ginnot in our table0
Horseradishnot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By jamieoliver. Recipe from Open Recipes.

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. Beetroot + tarragontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together184 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Lemon + dilltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together976 recipes

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

  3. Dill + tarragontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together111 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).

  4. Lemon + tarragontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,137 recipes

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

  5. Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beetroot, lemon, sugar, gin, salmon, dill, tarragon):

  1. Limefits better
  2. Orangethe original
  3. Avocadofits about as well
  4. Cherryfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against beetroot, lemon, sugar, gin, salmon, dill, tarragon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.