Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and 81,283 recipes mention both. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
Excellent Way to Dress Finnan Haddies
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.
Prepare the fish
Wash the finnan haddies well in hot water.
Wipe the fish and place it in a pan.
Pour milk and water over the fish to almost cover it.
Bake and serve
Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for twenty minutes, basting occasionally.
When done, place on a hot dish and rub with a bit of butter.
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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Finnan haddies
- The main fish, which becomes tender and flaky as it bakes in the liquid.
- Milk
- Adds moisture and gentle richness, and its milk sugars brown lightly at the surface during baking.
- Butter
- Adds fat and flavour when rubbed over the hot fish just before serving.
The step that matters
Baking with basting. Fish cooks quickly and dries out easily. Keeping it partly submerged in the milk and water and basting it during the twenty minutes helps it stay moist and cook evenly.
“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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