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Moulded Salmon

A steamed salmon mixture baked in a pudding mold, served with a sauce of milk, cornflour, butter, egg, ketchup, mace, and cayenne.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Moulded Salmon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the salmon

  1. Chop the salmon finely and mash it in a bowl with the back of a spoon, adding the melted butter until smooth.

  2. In a separate bowl, mix the breadcrumbs with the beaten eggs and season with pepper, salt, and parsley.

  3. Combine the salmon mixture with the egg mixture and mix well.

Mould and steam

  1. Transfer the mixture into a buttered pudding mold and steam or boil for 30 minutes.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. For the sauce, heat the milk to a boil and thicken with cornflour.

  2. Stir in the butter, then add the raw egg, ketchup, mace, and cayenne, cooking for one minute to set the egg.

  3. Pour the sauce over the molded salmon when served.

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

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

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Salmon + anchovytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together535 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Egg + anchovytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,330 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + anchovytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,697 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the mixture and help it set firm when steamed.
Salmon
Provides the main body and flavour of the mould.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the salmon mixture.
Breadcrumbs
Absorb moisture and give the mould a softer, lighter body.
Cornflour
Thickens the milk into a smooth sauce.
Raw egg
Enriches the sauce and sets slightly when briefly cooked.

The step that matters

Thickening the sauce with the raw egg. Adding the raw egg to hot sauce and cooking it briefly sets the egg gently and thickens the sauce. If it boils too hard or for too long, the egg can scramble and the sauce turns grainy.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, egg, butter, pepper, parsley, milk, anchovy. 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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