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Baked Salmon

Baked salmon stuffed with buttered bread and herbs, baked with a butter‑flour gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 887 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Baked Salmon

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the fish

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Season the fish inside and out with salt and pepper.

  3. Prepare the stuffing by mixing the buttered bread with hot milk or water and optional herbs.

  4. Stuff the fish and tie it closed with thread.

  5. Place muffin rings or a trivet in a dripping pan and put the fish on top.

  6. Dot the fish with butter and dredge with flour.

  7. Add 1 pint of hot water to the pan for basting.

Bake

  1. Bake for 1 hour, basting frequently.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. After removing the fish, fry the lemon slices in the pan.

  2. Dredge the fried lemon with 1 teaspoon of flour and add a small piece of butter.

  3. Stir until browned, then add ½ cup boiling water and stir until smooth.

  4. Strain the gravy over the fish and serve with boiled potatoes.

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. Sage + lemontop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together887 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Pepper + sagetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

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

  4. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

What each ingredient does

Whole salmon
Forms the main body of the dish, cooked whole and kept moist by basting.
Buttered bread
Makes a moist stuffing that fills the cavity and absorbs the cooking juices.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the surface brown during baking.
Flour
Dredged over the fish and used in the gravy to thicken it.
Lemon
Fried in the pan to add a bright, acidic flavour to the gravy.

The step that matters

Stir the gravy until browned, then until smooth. Browning the flour and butter in the pan builds colour and toasted flavour. Adding the boiling water while stirring prevents lumps, so the flour thickens the liquid into a smooth gravy.

Swap the sage

The recipe marks sage as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, pepper, bread, milk, butter, flour, lemon):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Marjoramfits about as well
  4. Sagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, pepper, bread, milk, butter, flour, lemon. 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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