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To Cook Salmon

Grilled salmon slices seasoned with salt, pepper, and vinegar, served hot.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and capers match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,550 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

To Cook Salmon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the salmon into two thin slices for better cooking.

  2. Wash the salmon in cold water.

  3. Dry the salmon with a cloth.

  4. Pour ½ cup of salad oil onto a plate.

  5. Dip both sides of the salmon slices in the oil.

  6. Season both sides of the salmon with salt and pepper.

Grill and serve

  1. Heat a gridiron over the fire to prevent sticking.

  2. Grill the salmon slices for a quarter of an hour, turning occasionally until pale brown.

  3. Remove the bone from the center of each slice.

  4. Serve the salmon on a hot dish with a napkin.

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. Parsley + caperstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,550 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + caperstop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,088 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Salmon + caperstop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together458 recipes

    Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).

  5. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 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

Salmon
Forms the main body of the dish; grilling firms its flesh and turns it opaque.
Salad oil
Coats the surface, adding moisture and helping prevent sticking on the grill.
Salt
Seasons the fish surface and brings out its flavour.

The step that matters

Grill the salmon slices for a quarter of an hour, turning occasionally until pale brown.. Grilling over fire needs a preheated, oiled gridiron and gentle turning; too much heat or flipping too early can tear the flesh and scorch the outside before the centre is cooked through.

Swap the capers

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, egg, pepper, vinegar, parsley):

  1. Dillfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Capersthe original
  4. Thymefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, egg, pepper, vinegar, parsley. 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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