Name: How to Broil Fish
Ingredients: fish (Cod, Ling, Hake, Haddocks, Pollacks, or Basse); flour; coarse sea salt; pepper; butter; mustard; vinegar

Why it works: Mustard and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,067 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

How to Broil Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish by cutting it into portions, omitting egg and bread crumbs.
Dust the fish pieces with flour.
Preheat the gridiron until nearly red hot and clean it thoroughly.
Place the fish on the gridiron over a clear fire.
Season with a little pepper and salt while cooking.
When done, rub butter on the fish before serving.
Serve with plain melted butter, mustard, and vinegar.

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.

Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together14,067 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,430 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Fish + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,488 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + mustardtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,066 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

Swap the mustard

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

Shallotfits about as well
Capsicumfits about as well
Mustardthe original
Chivefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, flour, pepper, butter, vinegar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.