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To Stuff a Haddock and Bake It

A haddock stuffed with bread crumbs, herbs, suet, and egg, then baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

To Stuff a Haddock and Bake It

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Wash and clean the haddock in cold water, then dry it with a cloth.

  2. Grate some bread crumbs onto a piece of paper.

  3. Wash the parsley in cold water and dry it with a cloth.

  4. Chop the parsley finely; you should have about 2 teaspoons.

  5. Chop a small sprig of thyme and marjoram finely; you should have about 1 teaspoon.

Make the stuffing

  1. Mix the herbs with 2 tablespoons of the bread crumbs.

  2. Add pepper and salt to taste, then mix in the suet.

  3. Stuff the belly of the fish with the stuffing and sew it up.

Coat and bake

  1. Break the egg into a plate and brush the fish with it, then roll it in the bread crumbs to coat.

  2. Grease a dish or tin with dripping.

  3. Place the fish in the dish and bake in the oven at 350°F (175°C) for 30 to 45 minutes, basting frequently with dripping.

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. Thyme + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  2. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Parsley + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Marjoram + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Haddock
Forms the main body of the dish, cooked gently in the oven to become flaky and moist.
Bread crumbs
Form the stuffing and a crisp coating that helps the fish brown in the oven.
Egg
Binds the crumb coating to the fish so it stays on during baking.
Suet
Adds fat to the stuffing, keeping it moist and rich as it cooks.
Dripping
Greases the dish and basting fat that encourages browning and moisture on the surface.

The step that matters

Sewing up and coating the fish. A loosely closed belly lets stuffing escape during baking, and an uneven egg and crumb coating browns unevenly. Securing the stuffing and coating the surface evenly keeps the fish moist and the crust intact.

“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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