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Fish Turbot

A baked salmon custard with a breadcrumb topping.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Fish Turbot

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Pour off all liquid from the can of salmon and remove all bones and skin.

  2. Heat the milk with an onion for a short time, then remove the onion.

Make the sauce

  1. In a bowl, mix the melted butter and flour, then add to the heated milk.

  2. Season the mixture with pepper and salt, and let it cool.

  3. Once cool, add the beaten egg and mix well.

Bake and serve

  1. In a pudding dish, layer the salmon and sauce until the dish is full.

  2. Top with grated bread crumbs and bake at 400°F (200°C) for 20 minutes.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Salmon
Forms the bulk of the dish and provides its main flavour and texture.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, which thickens when combined with flour.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth sauce that holds the dish together.
Butter
Adds richness and helps make the flour-thickened sauce smooth.
Egg
Adds structure, setting the custard as the dish bakes.
Bread crumbs
Forms a topping that browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Let the sauce cool before adding the egg. Eggs scramble when added to hot liquid, which would leave the custard grainy. Cooling the sauce first lets the egg blend in smoothly and then set evenly in the oven.

“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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