Skip to main content
Main

Stuffed Conger Eel

A stuffed conger eel baked with a butter‑flour sauce flavored with salt, pepper, lemon juice, and optional caramel coloring.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Stuffed Conger Eel

Oven, in the book's wordsA cool oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a cool oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare and bake

  1. Prepare the veal seasoning and sew it into the eel.

  2. Place the stuffed eel in a deep dish and cover it with water.

  3. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for about one hour.

  4. Remove the eel and keep it warm.

Make the sauce

  1. Strain the cooking liquid, measure about 1 pint, and set aside.

  2. In a saucepan, melt the butter and whisk in the flour to make a roux.

  3. Gradually add the reserved cooking liquid, stirring until smooth.

  4. Add a few drops of caramel for color, then let it boil for a few minutes.

  5. Season the sauce with salt, pepper, and lemon juice.

Serve

  1. Pour the sauce over the eel and serve hot.

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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. Veal + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  5. Flour + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

Eel
Is the main dish, cooked whole around its veal stuffing.
Veal
Provides a savory meat stuffing that flavors the eel as it bakes.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid into a smooth sauce when cooked with butter.
Butter
Forms the roux with the flour, adding richness and body to the sauce.

The step that matters

Making the roux. Flour must cook briefly in melted butter before liquid is added, so it thickens smoothly without a raw floury taste. Adding the liquid gradually while stirring prevents lumps.

“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.

You might also like

Lemon SauceLemon Sauce236 recipesVeal PattiesVeal Patties50 recipesBeef, Mutton, or Veal BrothBeef, Mutton, or Veal Broth6 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipes