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Stewed Fish

A baked fish topped with breadcrumbs, herbs, mushrooms, and wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Stewed 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. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

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

  2. Butter a baking dish liberally.

  3. Mix bread crumbs, minced herbs, pepper, salt, and nutmeg; sprinkle half in the dish.

Assemble

  1. Place the fish on top, then cover with the remaining bread crumb mixture and dot with butter.

  2. Drizzle lemon juice over the fish.

  3. In a separate bowl, mix mushrooms, shallots, and parsley; layer this on top of the fish.

  4. Add enough gravy and white wine to come up to the fish without covering it.

Bake

  1. Bake until the fish is cooked through, about 20-30 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.

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 + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

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

  2. Mushroom + shallottop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,982 recipes

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

  3. Nutmeg + shallottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,019 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Nutmeg + lemontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Lemon + shallottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,523 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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 and cooks gently to flake when done.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden topping while absorbing buttery juices beneath.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the crumbs brown in the oven.
Mushrooms
Release moisture and savory flavor into the liquid around the fish.
White wine
Adds acidity and moisture, keeping the fish tender as it bakes.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor of the fish.

The step that matters

Keeping the liquid below the fish. Adding gravy and wine only up to the fish, not over it, keeps the topping from becoming soggy while the fish gently poaches in the liquid below.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, bread, pepper, butter, lemon, mushroom, shallot):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, bread, pepper, butter, lemon, mushroom, shallot. 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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