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Turbot Et Barbue

A boiled turbot seasoned with salt, milk, lemon, and served with parsley and anchovy-based sauces.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Turbot Et Barbue

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the fish

  1. Rub the fish with lemon.

  2. In a pot, combine half salt and half milk, enough to cover the fish.

  3. Bring the mixture to a gentle boil, ensuring it only simmers at the edges.

  4. Check the fish; when it gives under your fingers, it is cooked.

  5. Drain the fish for 15 minutes.

Make the sauces and serve

  1. Heat fine oil with salt, coarse pepper, and a splash of vinegar without boiling, then pour over the fish.

  2. Melt butter in a pot, add a pinch of flour, salt, coarse pepper, a chopped anchovy, and fine capers; stir until thickened without boiling, then serve over the fish.

  3. Serve garnished with fresh parsley on a towel-covered board.

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. Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Turbot + anchovytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together110 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

Milk
Poaching liquid with salt that gently cooks the fish and keeps it moist.
Butter
Melts into the sauce to give it richness and a smooth, silky texture.
Flour
Thickens the butter sauce so it coats the fish.
Anchovy
Adds savoury depth and salty flavour to the butter sauce.

The step that matters

Poaching at a gentle simmer. Boiling vigorously toughens the delicate protein of the fish and breaks it apart, so keeping the liquid barely simmering at the edges keeps the flesh tender and moist.

“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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