Skip to main content
Main

Eel Pie

A savory pie filled with boiled eel, seasoned with lemon, shallot, mace, and herbs, topped with puff pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Lemon and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Eel Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA brisk oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a brisk oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Cut the eels into 2-3 inch pieces, removing heads, tails, and fins.

  2. Boil the eels with lemon peel, shallot, mace, and broth until covered.

Make the sauce

  1. Thicken the broth with butter and flour, then add lemon juice.

  2. Strain the mixture and let it cool, then pour over the eels in a pie dish.

Bake

  1. Sprinkle with pepper, salt, and parsley, then cover with puff pastry.

  2. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) for about 1 hour and 15 minutes.

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. Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Shallot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  4. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

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

  5. Shallot + lemontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,523 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Eels
Provide the main protein, which becomes tender as they simmer in the broth.
Flour
Thickens the broth into a smooth sauce that coats the eels.
Butter
Adds richness and helps bind the flour into the thickened broth.
Puff pastry
Forms a crisp, golden crust that seals the pie and browns in the oven.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich broth and sauce.

The step that matters

Thicken the broth with butter and flour. Cooking flour in butter first, then whisking in the broth, prevents lumps and gives a smooth, stable sauce. Adding the lemon juice afterward keeps its bright flavor intact.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (shallot, lemon, veal, butter, flour, pepper, parsley):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against shallot, lemon, veal, butter, flour, pepper, parsley. 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.

You might also like

Lemon SauceLemon Sauce236 recipesVeal PattiesVeal Patties50 recipesBeef, Mutton, or Veal BrothBeef, Mutton, or Veal Broth6 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipes