Why it works: Fish and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,668 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓
Dried Salt Fish Dumplings
Ingredients
Directions
Boil the dried salt fish or smoked fish until cooked.
Minced the cooked fish.
Combine the minced fish with mashed potatoes, bread, and flour.
Form the mixture into dumplings.
Boil the dumplings again until cooked through.
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.
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Fish + breadtop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,668 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
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Fish + potatotop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together134 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).
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Potato + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,355 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Potato + breadtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together434 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
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Bread + flourtop 25% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together10,383 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Bread and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 10,383 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
Swap the potato
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, bread, flour):
- Shallotfits better
- Leekfits better
- Arrowrootfits better
- Potatothe original
Fit is the average pairing score against fish, bread, flour. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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