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Baked Fish

A fish coated in buttered breadcrumbs and baked with herbs and sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 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 ↓

Baked Fish

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Scrape the fish.

  2. Wash the fish.

  3. Moisten the bread crumbs with melted butter.

  4. Add salt, pepper, minced parsley, and beaten egg to the bread crumbs.

  5. Rub the fish with salt and pepper.

  6. Stuff the fish with the mixture.

  7. Fasten the fish with skewers.

Bake and serve

  1. Butter a baking sheet.

  2. Place the fish on the sheet in a baking pan.

  3. Dredge the fish with pepper, salt, and flour.

  4. Cover the bottom of the pan with hot water.

  5. Bake at 400°F (200°C) for about 1 hour, basting every 15 minutes.

  6. When cooked, carefully slip the fish onto a hot platter.

  7. Pour tomato or Hollandaise sauce around the fish.

  8. Garnish with lemon points and parsley.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  3. Fish + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

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

  5. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Fish
Forms the main body of the dish, cooking gently inside the stuffing and steam from the pan.
Stale bread crumbs
Absorb the melted butter and egg to form a moist, binding stuffing.
Egg
Binds the bread crumb stuffing so it holds together while baking.
Melted butter
Moistens the bread crumbs and adds richness and browning to the stuffing.

The step that matters

Basting every 15 minutes. Regular basting with the pan liquid keeps the fish surface from drying out during the long bake, while the hot water in the pan gently steams the flesh. Opening the oven often lowers the temperature, so basting should be done quickly.

“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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