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Baked Cusk

A baked fish dish with cream, egg whites, celery, lemon, and cloves.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,467 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Baked Cusk

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 fish

  1. Boil the fish in salted water for 20 minutes.

  2. Set the kettle aside to parboil the fish for 1 hour.

  3. Remove the bones and shape the fish on the serving dish.

Make the dressing and bake

  1. In a bowl, mix the cream, beaten egg whites, chopped celery, cloves, and lemon juice.

  2. Pour the dressing over the fish.

  3. Bake at 400°F (200°C) for 20 minutes until golden brown.

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. Celery + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,467 recipes

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

  2. Celery + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).

  3. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Lemon + clovetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  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

Cod or halibut
Forms the main body of the dish, holding its shape once boned and served.
Cream
Provides moisture and richness to the dressing that coats the fish.
Egg whites
Set when heated, helping the dressing firm up and turn golden in the oven.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich cream and balances the fish.

The step that matters

Baking the dressing. Egg whites set when heated, so baking only until the dressing is golden and firm keeps it tender. Overbaking can make it tough and dry.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, butter, egg, celery, lemon):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, butter, egg, celery, lemon. 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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