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How to Curry Fish

A fish curry made with onions, butter, curry powder, flour, and served over rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and rice are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,433 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

How to Curry Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Make the gravy

  1. Make a rich fish gravy using fish bones and some flesh.

  2. Fry the onions in butter and add them to the gravy.

  3. Stir in the curry powder and a piece of butter rolled in flour.

Cook the fish

  1. Half-fry the fish as if for stewing, then place it in a stew pan.

  2. Let the fish stew slowly over low heat until cooked through.

Prepare the rice

  1. Prepare the rice by boiling it gently until done, then drain.

  2. Place the saucepan with rice on the stove or fire until grains separate.

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. Onion + ricetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,433 recipes

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

  2. Fish + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,488 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Fish + ricetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together270 recipes

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

  5. Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

Fish
Provides the main protein and flavour, with bones and flesh enriching the gravy.
Onions
Add sweetness and body to the gravy as they soften and brown in butter.
Butter
Carries the onion flavour and adds richness to the gravy.
Curry powder
Supplies the spice aroma and flavour that define the dish.
Flour
Thickens the gravy so it coats the fish and rice.

The step that matters

Half-fry the fish before stewing. Searing the surface firms the flesh so it holds together during slow stewing instead of breaking apart in the gravy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, butter, flour, rice):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, butter, flour, rice. 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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