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Curried Haddock

A haddock curry made with beef stock, water, curry powder, optional onion, and optionally fried in lard or oil.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Curried Haddock

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Fillet the haddock and set aside.

Make the curry

  1. Combine beef stock and water in a pot.

  2. Add curry powder to the pot.

  3. If using onion, chop it and add to the pot.

  4. Bring the mixture to a simmer and add the haddock.

  5. Cook for 1 hour until the fish is tender.

Finish

  1. Fry the fish in clean lard or oil for a few minutes before adding it to the curry.

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. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  2. Haddock + oniontop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together483 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Haddock + beeftop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together34 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Haddock fillets
Provides the main protein, which becomes flaky and opaque as it cooks in the liquid.
Beef stock
Supplies the savoury liquid base that carries the flavour of the curry.
Curry powder
Releases aromatic spices into the hot liquid, flavouring the whole dish.

The step that matters

Keep the curry at a gentle simmer once the haddock goes in. Vigorous boiling agitates and overheats delicate fish proteins, making them tight and dry. A gentle simmer lets the fish cook evenly and stay tender.

Swap the onion

The recipe marks onion as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (haddock, beef):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Onionthe original
  3. Tomatofits about as well
  4. Chivefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against haddock, beef. 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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