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Salmon Grillse with a Purse of Sorrel

A salmon fillet grilled and served with sorrel sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Salmon and sorrel work together. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and 38 recipes mention both. Both carry eugenol, which smells clove, spicy. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Contains: wheat, fish (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Prepare

  1. Trim the salmon with a sharp knife and remove the skin.

  2. Prepare a gentle fire using good wood ashes.

Grill and serve

  1. Place the salmon at a distance over the fire, turning it on both sides until it is nicely colored.

  2. Pour sorrel sauce onto a serving dish and lay the salmon over it.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Salmon + sorreltop 12% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together38 recipes

    Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).

  2. Sorrel + saucetop 8% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together158 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Salmon + breadtop 9% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together941 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Salmon + saucetop 10% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together1,763 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Bread + saucetop 11% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together4,933 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 body of the dish, cooked gently until flaky and nicely colored.
Sorrel sauce
Adds a tangy, acidic note that contrasts with the rich, fatty salmon.

The step that matters

Placing the salmon at a distance over the fire. A gentle, indirect heat lets the salmon cook through and color evenly without the outside burning before the center is done. Turning it on both sides promotes even browning and cooking.

“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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