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Broiled Mackerel

Broiled mackerel seasoned with pepper, salt, oil, and served with parsley butter and lemon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Broiled Mackerel

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Remove the gills and insides from the mackerel and wipe it clean and dry.

  2. Open the back of the mackerel and season with pepper, salt, and oil.

Broil

  1. Broil the mackerel over a clear fire, turning it on both sides and the back.

  2. Cook for about 10 minutes until the flesh can be detached from the bone.

Stuff and serve

  1. Mix chopped parsley with butter, pepper, salt, and a squeeze of lemon juice.

  2. Stuff the mixture into the back of the mackerel and 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.

  1. Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

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

  4. Parsley + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Mackerel
Forms the main body of the dish, with flesh that becomes firm and flaky when broiled.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, melting into the fish to carry flavour.
Oil
Coats the fish to help seasoning cling and reduce surface drying under heat.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich, fatty flavour of the fish and butter.

The step that matters

Cooking until the flesh releases from the bone. Broiling over a clear fire can overcook the thin parts before the thick areas are done. Checking that the flesh detaches from the bone shows the fish is cooked through while staying moist.

“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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