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Baked Fish with Cheese

A baked halibut topped with salt pork and cheese, seasoned with salt and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Pork and cheese are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,735 recipes. Both carry 12-methyltridecanal, which smells tallowy, beefy. The science ↓

Baked Fish with Cheese

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare and assemble

  1. Cut the salt pork into small pieces and place in an enamelware or aluminum baking pan.

  2. Lay the fish on top, dust with salt and pepper, and cover with cheese that has been processed through a coarse food chopper.

Bake

  1. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) for about 20 minutes.

Check the fish

  1. Ensure the fish is cut about ½ inch thick.

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. Pork + cheesetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,735 recipes

    Shared aroma: 12-methyltridecanal (tallowy, beefy).

  2. Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,121 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Cheese + peppertop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,861 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Halibut
Forms the main body of the dish and cooks to a flaky texture.
Salt pork
Renders fat into the pan, adding moisture and savory flavor to the fish.
Cheese
Melts over the fish, adding richness and browning at the surface.

The step that matters

Baking the fish. Halibut is lean and cooks quickly, so it can dry out if baked too long. Keeping the fish about ½ inch thick helps it cook evenly within the stated time.

“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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