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Fish Stock

A clear stock made from fish trimmings, vegetables, and herbs simmered in water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and carrot are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 21,601 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Fish Stock

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and simmer

  1. Cut up the fish and place it in a pot with the other ingredients.

  2. Add the water and bring to a simmer.

  3. Simmer for 2 hours, skimming the surface carefully.

Strain

  1. Strain the stock through a fine sieve.

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 + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  2. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  3. Lemon + carrottop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,351 recipes

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

  4. Beef + carrottop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,606 recipes

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

  5. Beef + fishtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together226 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

White fish trimmings
Provide the main flavour and gelatin-rich body that give the stock its character.
Onions
Add sweetness and savoury depth to the stock as they simmer.
Carrots
Contribute gentle sweetness and aroma to the stock.
Sweet herbs
Add aromatic fragrance that flavours the liquid during simmering.

The step that matters

Skimming the surface during simmering. Impurities and coagulated proteins rise to the surface as the stock simmers. Skimming them off keeps the stock clear and free of a bitter or cloudy taste.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, fish, onion, carrot):

  1. Coconutfits better
  2. Limefits about as well
  3. Lemonthe original
  4. Avocadofits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, fish, onion, carrot. 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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