Skip to main content
Main

Waterzooi

A creamy Belgian fish stew with vegetables, butter, cream, and egg yolk.

From the Wikibooks Cookbook · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Leek and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,310 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Waterzooi

Time10 minutes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Melt butter in large pot over medium heat.

  2. Add vegetables, bay leaf, and peppercorns, then sauté for a few minutes.

  3. Stir in the butter, then cook for 5 minutes without allowing the vegetables to brown.

Poach the fish

  1. Add stock and bring to boil.

  2. Add fish, reduce heat, and let simmer for 10 minutes.

  3. Remove fish and cut into pieces.

Finish and serve

  1. Temper 200 ml of the stock into the egg yolk, stirring to prevent curdling.

  2. Stir the mixture back into the pot with the cream, and bring to just below boiling.

  3. Add fish and taste everything for flavour, adding salt as required.

  4. Serve in shallow bowls.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

797Calories
33 gProtein
49 gFat
56 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 11 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Salmon100g cooked208
Potato1 medium (173g) baked161
Vegetable1 tbsp (14g)120
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Cream1 tbsp (15ml) heavy51
Onion1 medium (110g)44
Carrot1 medium (61g)25
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Bay Leaf1 leaf (0.6g)2
Salt1 tsp (6g)0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

Recipe from the Wikibooks Cookbook.

Steps grouped into stages for easier reading; the method is the source's own.

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. Leek + carrottop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,310 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Carrot + potatotop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,107 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  3. Leek + potatotop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  4. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Enriches the broth with fat and rich flavour, and helps soften the vegetables without browning.
Leek
Adds mild sweetness and aromatic depth to the stock as it softens.
Potatoes
Release starch as they cook, giving the broth body and a slightly thickened texture.
Egg yolk
Thickens the cream into a smooth, velvety sauce when tempered and gently heated.
Double cream
Provides richness, body and a silky mouthfeel to the finished broth.

The step that matters

Tempering the egg yolk. Adding hot stock to the yolk too quickly scrambles the egg. Stirring while adding a little hot liquid gradually raises its temperature so it blends in smoothly, and the mixture must then stay below boiling to avoid curdling.

Swap the carrot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, butter, leek, potato, egg, cream):

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Carrotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, butter, leek, potato, egg, cream. 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.

You might also like

Potato CroquettesPotato Croquettes255 recipesCarrot SoupCarrot Soup134 recipesFried FishFried Fish120 recipesFish CroquettesFish Croquettes81 recipes