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The Brill

A brill fish cured with salt, vinegar, lemon, and simmered, served with lemon, parsley, horseradish, and lobster sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 20% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,334 recipes. Both carry acetic acid, which smells sour, vinegar. The science ↓

The Brill

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Thoroughly clean the brill and remove the scales.

  2. Do not cut off the fins; rub the fish with lemon juice and a little salt.

Poach

  1. Place the brill in a fish kettle and cover with cold water.

  2. Add ½ cup of coarse sea salt and 1 tablespoon of vinegar.

  3. Bring the water to a boil, then reduce to a simmer for 10 to 20 minutes, depending on the size of the fish.

  4. Skim the surface to maintain the fish's color.

Serve

  1. Serve on a napkin, garnished with lemon, curled parsley, and horseradish.

  2. Accompany with lobster sauce in a tureen.

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. Vinegar + lemontop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,334 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

What each ingredient does

Brill
The main fish, poached whole so its flesh cooks gently in simmering liquid.
Coarse sea salt
Seasons the poaching water and firms the fish's surface during gentle cooking.
Vinegar
Adds a mild acidity to the poaching water that brightens the fish's flavor.

The step that matters

Keep the poaching water at a gentle simmer. A hard boil agitates and breaks up the delicate flesh and can cause it to cook unevenly, so the water should only simmer.

“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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