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Quenelles of Whiting

Quenelles of Whiting are dumplings made from whiting fillets and mixture of soaked bread crumbs, butter, shallot, cloves, mace, and eggs, served with Italian sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Sauce and whiting match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 236 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Quenelles of Whiting

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the panade

  1. Soak the crumb of 2 rolls in ½ cup milk for 30 minutes.

  2. Press out the milk.

  3. In a saucepan, combine the soaked crumb, 1 tablespoon béchamel sauce, 2 tablespoons butter, shallot, cloves, and mace.

  4. Cook over low heat, stirring for 10 minutes until firm.

  5. Remove the spices and shallot.

  6. Let cool.

Make the quenelle mixture

  1. Scrape the meat from the fillets of 2 whiting.

  2. Combine the scraped meat with the cooled panade and 2 tablespoons butter in a mortar.

  3. Pound until smooth and well mixed.

  4. Add 3 eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

  5. Season with pepper and coarse sea salt.

  6. Test a small piece by rolling it in flour and boiling it.

  7. If the test piece is not firm enough, add another egg.

  8. Pass the mixture through a wire sieve.

Shape and serve

  1. Butter 8 dariole molds.

  2. Fill the molds with the mixture.

  3. Steam for 20 minutes.

  4. Turn out onto a dish.

  5. Serve with Italian sauce.

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. Sauce + whitingtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together236 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Shallot + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,677 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  4. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  5. Sauce + shallottop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,303 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Crumb of 2 rolls
Soaked bread crumb forms the panade that gives the quenelles a light, tender body.
Whiting fillets
Provides the delicate fish meat that forms the main body of the quenelles.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and set when heated, giving the quenelles firmness.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the panade and the fish mixture.
Milk
Soaks the crumb, keeping the panade moist and soft for a smooth mixture.

The step that matters

Testing the mixture before steaming. The mixture must be firm enough to hold its shape when cooked. Egg adds binding, so testing a small poached piece lets you judge whether another egg is needed before filling the molds.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, sauce, butter, shallot, clove, whiting, egg):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, sauce, butter, shallot, clove, whiting, egg. 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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