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Salmon in a Mould

A steamed salmon custard baked in a mold with a buttery sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Salmon in a Mould

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the salmon

  1. Drain the liquid from the salmon, remove the bones and skin, and chop the salmon finely.

  2. Mix the chopped salmon with the melted butter until smooth.

  3. Season the mixture with salt, pepper, minced parsley, and celery if desired.

Make the custard

  1. Beat the eggs well.

  2. Add the cracker crumbs to the eggs and mix thoroughly.

  3. Transfer the mixture to a buttered mold.

  4. Steam the mixture for one hour.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. Boil the milk for the sauce.

  2. Thicken the milk with corn starch.

  3. Add the salmon liquid, butter, and one egg to the sauce, mixing carefully.

  4. Boil the sauce for one minute.

  5. Turn the salmon out of the mold.

  6. Pour the sauce around the salmon.

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 + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Celery + corntop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together920 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the salmon and crumbs and set into a firm, sliceable custard when steamed.
Salmon
Provides the main body and flavour of the custard.
Cracker crumbs
Absorb liquid and give the custard body so it holds its shape.
Milk
Forms the base of the sauce, adding creaminess and body.
Corn starch
Thickens the milk into a smooth, pourable sauce.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to both the salmon mixture and the sauce.

The step that matters

Boil the sauce for one minute after adding the egg. Eggs added to a hot sauce can scramble or curdle if overheated, so mix carefully and keep the heat controlled. Brief boiling helps the starch fully thicken the sauce.

Swap the celery

The recipe marks celery as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, butter, pepper, parsley, egg, milk, corn):

  1. Dillfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Celerythe original

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