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Fish Pie, with Tench and Eels

A savory pie made with tench, eels, onions, herbs, mace, anchovies, and hard‑boiled eggs, baked in puff pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Isabella Beeton · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper 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 ↓

Fish Pie, with Tench and Eels

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Clean and bone the tench.

  2. Skin and bone the eels.

  3. Cut the fish into pieces 2 inches long, leaving the sides of the tench whole.

Make the broth

  1. Put the bones into a stewpan with the onions, herbs, mace, anchovies, water, and seasoning.

  2. Let them simmer gently for 1 hour.

  3. Strain the broth, let it cool, and skim off all the fat.

Assemble and bake

  1. Lay the tench and eels in a pie dish.

  2. Between each layer, put seasoning, chopped parsley, and hard-boiled eggs.

  3. Pour in part of the strained liquor.

  4. Cover with puff paste.

  5. Bake for 1/2 hour or more.

  6. When done, heat the remainder of the liquor and pour into the pie.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

129Calories
8 gProtein
5 gFat
12 gCarbs

Counts 5 of 8 ingredients. The other 3 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Onion1 medium (110g)44
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Parsley1 tbsp chopped fresh (3.8g)1
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Waternot in our table0
Eelnot in our table0
Macenot in our table0

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

By Isabella Beeton. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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. See the original page.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  3. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  4. Parsley + macetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,268 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. Mace + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

Mace and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,257 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

What each ingredient does

Tench
Forms the main flesh of the pie, cooking to flaky portions as it bakes.
Eels
Adds rich, fatty flesh that keeps the pieces moist during baking.
Hard-boiled eggs
Add firm, set texture and richness between the layers of fish.
Anchovies
Add savoury depth to the broth, enriching its flavour without a distinct fishy taste.

The step that matters

Skimming the broth fat. Straining and chilling the broth lets fat rise and solidify so it can be removed. Leftover fat would make the pie greasy and the liquor cloudy when reheated.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (parsley, onion, egg, pepper):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Dillfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against parsley, onion, egg, 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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