Name: Brill, Cod, Haddock, Salmon, or Turbot
Ingredients: cooked fish (brill, cod, haddock, salmon, or turbot); Bechamel sauce; pepper; coarse sea salt; cayenne pepper; fried bread crumbs

Why it works: Fish and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,668 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓

Brill, Cod, Haddock, Salmon, or Turbot

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the filling

Flake the cooked fish into small pieces.
In a saucepan, combine the fish with béchamel sauce and heat until very hot.

Assemble and bake

Fill scallop shells with the fish mixture, one for each person.
Season with pepper, coarse sea salt, or cayenne pepper to taste.
Top with a few fried bread crumbs.
Place in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 1 minute.
Serve immediately.

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.

Fish + breadtop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,668 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,964 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Fish + saucetop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,487 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Fish + peppertop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,948 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sauce + breadtop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,934 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

Cooked fish: Forms the main body of the filling, providing flaky texture and the dish's core flavour.
Bechamel sauce: Binds the fish into a creamy, moist filling that stays together in the shells.
Fried bread crumbs: Adds a crisp, golden topping that contrasts with the soft filling.

“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.