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Steamed Fish

Steamed fish seasoned with vinegar, pepper, and salt, garnished with parsley and beet.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Steamed Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Secure the tail of the fish in its mouth, forming a circle with the body.

  2. Pour ½ pint of vinegar over the fish, seasoned with pepper and coarse sea salt.

  3. Let it stand for 1 hour in a cool place.

  4. Pour off the vinegar and place the fish in a steamer over boiling water.

Steam and serve

  1. Steam for 20 minutes or longer for large fish until the meat easily separates from the bone.

  2. Drain well and serve on a clean, folded white napkin on a platter.

  3. Garnish with sprigs of curled parsley or fanciful beet cuttings.

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. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

  3. Vinegar + parsleytop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,477 recipes

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

  4. Fish + parsleytop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Fish + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,948 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Whole fish
Forms the main dish; its flesh cooks through and separates from the bone when done.
Vinegar
Acidity that is poured over the fish to season it before steaming.

The step that matters

Steam until the meat easily separates from the bone. Steaming for too short a time leaves the flesh firm and attached to the bone, while longer steaming for large fish is needed so the heat reaches the centre and the flesh becomes tender and flakes.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Dillfits about as well
  4. Marjoramfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, vinegar, pepper. 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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