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Escalloped Fish

A baked cod dish topped with a butter‑flour‑milk sauce and cracker crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Escalloped Fish

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Escalloped Fish

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the sauce

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Melt the butter in a saucepan, then whisk in the flour until smooth.

  3. Gradually stir in the boiling milk and cook until the sauce thickens.

  4. Chop the hard-boiled eggs and mix them into the sauce.

Assemble and bake

  1. In a deep dish, layer the cod fish and pour the sauce over it.

  2. Repeat the layers until the dish is filled.

  3. Cover the top with cracker crumbs.

  4. Bake for 30 minutes.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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

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

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

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

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Fish + milktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,432 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Cod fish
Forms the main body of the dish, providing the flaky texture and savory flavor.
Butter
Fat that enriches the sauce and carries flavor through the base.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth sauce that holds the layers together.
Milk
Liquid base of the sauce, giving it body and a creamy texture when thickened.
Hard-boiled eggs
Add richness and body to the sauce, with a soft, firm texture.
Cracker crumbs
Form a crisp topping that browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Thickening the sauce. Flour must be whisked into the melted butter until smooth, then the boiling milk added gradually, so starch granules swell evenly. Adding milk too fast or skipping the whisking can leave lumps and a thin sauce that fails to hold the layers.

“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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