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Mackerel Puddings

A savory pudding made from mackerel, pickled pork, spices, and suet crust, boiled until cooked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Mackerel Puddings

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Clean the mackerel, removing the head, fins, and tail.

  2. Cut the fish into 2‑inch blocks.

  3. Dice the pickled pork and season with pepper, coarse sea salt, and parsley or fennel.

Assemble and cook

  1. Combine the fish and pork in a suet crust pudding.

  2. Boil for 1 hour or more, depending on size.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Fish + porktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together668 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  3. Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,121 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Fish + parsleytop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,341 recipes

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

  5. Pork + parsleytop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,804 recipes

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Mackerel
Forms the main body of the filling and provides rich, savoury flavour.
Pickled pork
Adds salty, fatty richness that keeps the filling moist during boiling.
Suet crust
Encloses the filling and forms a soft, tender pastry that steams as it cooks.

The step that matters

Boil for 1 hour or more, depending on size. The pudding must cook long enough for the fish to become fully cooked through and the suet crust to steam until tender. Larger pieces need more time, so check the size before judging doneness.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Thymefits about as well
  2. Marjoramfits about as well
  3. Parsleythe original
  4. Sagefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, pork, pepper. 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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