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Sardines in Aspic

A chilled dish of sardines and anchovy in aspic, flavored with cream, lemon, cayenne, and carmine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Sardines in Aspic

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Remove the bones and skin from the sardines and anchovy.

Make the filling

  1. Pound the sardines and anchovy well, then add the cream, lemon juice, cayenne pepper, salt, carmine, and ½ cup of melted aspic.

  2. Mix well and pour into small molds, allowing them to set.

Finish and serve

  1. Cut thin rounds from the remaining aspic.

  2. Turn out the molds and place one on each round.

  3. Garnish with chervil or other herbs.

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

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

  2. Anchovy + creamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together798 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

  3. Anchovy + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,080 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Anchovy + peppertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Cream + peppertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together21,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Cream and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Sardines
Form the main body of the savoury fish filling.
Anchovy
Adds concentrated savoury depth to the fish filling.
Aspic
Gelatin sets the mixture into a firm, sliceable jelly.
Cream
Adds fat that softens the pounded fish and gives a smoother texture.

The step that matters

Melting and cooling the aspic before mixing. Aspic is gelatin-based and sets as it cools. If it is too hot, the fish filling stays loose and will not set firmly in the molds. If it has already begun to set, it will not blend smoothly into the pounded fish.

“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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