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Boiled Salt Mackerel

A boiled salted mackerel served with a butter and cream sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By F. L. Gillette and Hugo Ziemann · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 7 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 ↓

Boiled Salt Mackerel

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Wash and clean off all the brine and salt from the mackerel.

  2. Soak the fish with the meat side down in cold water overnight.

  3. In the morning, rinse the fish in one or two waters.

  4. Wrap each fish in a cloth and put it into a kettle with plenty of cold water.

  5. Cook the fish for about thirty minutes.

Make the sauce

  1. Heat a small cup of milk to scalding.

  2. Stir into the milk a teaspoonful of cornstarch wet up with a little water.

  3. When the mixture thickens, add two tablespoonfuls of butter, pepper, salt, and chopped parsley to taste.

  4. Beat an egg lightly, pour the sauce gradually over it, put the mixture again over the fire, and stir for one minute, not more.

Serve

  1. Carefully remove the fish from the cloth, remove the backbones, and pour over a little melted butter and cream; add a light sprinkle of pepper.

  2. Pour the sauce over the fish, and serve with slices of lemon or sprigs of parsley or watercress as garnish.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

713Calories
21 gProtein
21 gFat
109 gCarbs

Counts 6 of 7 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 6 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Parsley1 tbsp chopped fresh (3.8g)1
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Waternot 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 F. L. Gillette and Hugo Ziemann. 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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

  5. Milk + peppertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together26,984 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

What each ingredient does

Mackerel (in the method)
The main fish, which is softened and freshened by soaking and gently poached.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, rounded flavour to the sauce and fish.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the sauce that carries the other flavourings.
Cornstarch
Thickens the milk into a smooth sauce as it heats.
Egg (in the method)
Enriches the sauce and gives it body when gently heated with it.

The step that matters

Adding the egg to the sauce. Egg thickens through gentle heat, but if the sauce is overheated or stirred too long after the egg goes in, the egg proteins can scramble and the sauce turns grainy. Pouring the sauce into the egg gradually and stirring only briefly keeps it smooth.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Cinnamonfits about as well
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Nutmegfits about as well
  4. Thymefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, milk, 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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