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Stewed Haddock

A stewed haddock dish simmered in fish stock, sherry, and anchovy sauce, finished with butter and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Haddock and sauce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 200 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Stewed Haddock

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish and stock

  1. Split the fish lengthwise and cut into square pieces.

  2. Boil the fins and head to make fish stock, then strain the liquid.

  3. Butter a porcelain saucepan and lay the fish pieces in, flesh side down.

Make the gravy

  1. Sprinkle each piece with cayenne pepper, mace, salt, and flour.

  2. Add 1 pint of the fish stock to the saucepan, cover, and simmer gently for 20 minutes, shaking occasionally.

  3. Stir in 2 teaspoons of reading sauce, 2 teaspoons of anchovy sauce, and ½ pint of sherry or Madeira wine.

  4. Rub 2 ounces of butter with 2 tablespoons of flour and stir into the gravy.

  5. Add more mace and cayenne if needed, and let it simmer for 10 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve in a deep dish, garnished with parsley and lemon, pouring the gravy over the fish.

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. Haddock + saucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together200 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Sauce + anchovytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Haddock + anchovytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together75 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Fish + anchovytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together637 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + fishtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,488 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Haddock
Forms the main body of the dish, becoming flaky and tender as it simmers gently.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel to the gravy.
Flour
Thickens the stock and sauce into a smooth gravy.
Sherry or madeira wine
Adds acidity and depth of flavour to the gravy.
Anchovy sauce
Contributes salty, savoury umami depth to the gravy.

The step that matters

Simmer gently with the lid on. Gentle simmering keeps the delicate fish from breaking apart and toughening, while the flour thickens the liquid evenly, so the gravy stays smooth rather than lumpy.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (haddock, butter, fish, pepper, flour, sauce, anchovy):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against haddock, butter, fish, pepper, flour, sauce, 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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