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Soused Shad

Soused Shad is a fish dish prepared by boiling, seasoning, and marinating in cider vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,395 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Soused Shad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Clean and cut the shad into quarters.

  2. Boil the shad in salted water for about 20 minutes.

  3. Drain the shad and let it cool completely.

Season and pickle

  1. Season each piece with additional salt (if needed), cayenne pepper, and a few grains of allspice.

  2. Add enough cider vinegar to cover the shad.

  3. Refrigerate for a few days before serving.

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 + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cider + vinegartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

  3. Allspice + vinegartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,548 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

  4. Allspice + cidertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together873 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

  5. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Shad
Forms the main body of the dish, becoming firm and flaky once cooked and cooled.
Cider vinegar
Acidity that sours and preserves the cooked fish as it marinates in the refrigerator.

The step that matters

Let the shad cool completely before seasoning and covering it with vinegar. Adding vinegar to warm fish can break it into pieces and make it mushy, and cooling lets the fish firm up so it holds its shape while it pickles.

Swap the allspice

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

  1. Allspicethe original
  2. Tarragonfits about as well
  3. Clovefits about as well
  4. Thymefits about as well

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