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Potted Herrings

A preserved herring dish baked in vinegar, seasoned with salt, pepper, and bay leaves, then clarified butter is poured over.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,814 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Potted Herrings

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Remove the heads and tails from the herrings.

  2. Wash, clean, and dry the herrings.

  3. Sprinkle salt and pepper inside and out of the herrings.

Bake

  1. Place the herrings in an earthenware dish, lay the roes beside them, and cover with white vinegar.

  2. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 2 hours.

Pot and finish

  1. Remove the bones.

  2. Pound the bones in a mortar.

  3. Press the ground bones into pots.

  4. Pour clarified butter on top.

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. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Herrings
The main fish, forming the body of the dish.
White vinegar
Its acid helps soften the bones during the long bake, so they can be pounded.
Bay leaves
Add a subtle aromatic flavour to the fish.

The step that matters

Baking in vinegar. The long, gentle bake in vinegar softens the small bones so they can be pounded and pressed into the pots. A shorter bake leaves the bones firm and gritty.

“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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