Name: Baked Halibut
Ingredients: 4 pounds halibut; flour, for dredging; coarse sea salt, to taste; salt pork, cut into small bits; hot water; 1 egg; 2 tablespoons butter; 2 tablespoons flour; water, as needed for gravy

Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Baked Halibut

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the fish

Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).
Place the halibut in a baking pan and dredge it with flour and coarse sea salt.
Sprinkle the bits of salt pork on top of the halibut.
Pour hot water into the pan until it reaches the bottom of the fish.

Bake and make the gravy

Bake for about 1 hour.
Whisk together the egg, butter, flour, and enough water to achieve your desired consistency.

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.

Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Pork + buttertop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together13,933 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together106,462 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together118,967 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Flour + porktop 27% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together11,187 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Halibut: Is the main protein that cooks through gently in the oven.
Salt pork: Renders fat over the fish, adding moisture and savory flavor as it bakes.
Egg: Thickens the gravy as it sets with heat, giving it body.
Butter: Adds fat and richness to the gravy.
Flour: Thickens the gravy and helps form a smooth, cohesive sauce.

“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.