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Fish, Pickled

A pickled fish dish using boiled fish, vinegar, water, onion, fennel, pepper, and sea salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Fennel and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,216 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Fish, Pickled

Ingredients

Directions

Make the pickle

  1. Mix the water and vinegar in a bowl.

  2. Add the sliced onion, fresh fennel, pepper, and coarse sea salt.

Pickle and store

  1. Place the boiled fish in a deep dish and pour the pickle over it.

  2. Baste the fish frequently to keep it well moistened.

  3. Store in a cool place; it will keep for several days.

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. Fennel + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,216 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Onion + fenneltop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,096 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  4. Vinegar + oniontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Vinegar
Provides the acidity that flavours and firms the fish in the pickle.
Onion
Adds aromatic flavour that infuses into the pickling liquid.
Fennel
Adds a mild aniseed aroma to the pickle.

The step that matters

Basting the fish frequently. Fish left in an acidic liquid can dry out or become unevenly flavoured at the surface. Regular basting keeps the surface moist and lets the pickle penetrate evenly.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, vinegar, fennel, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, vinegar, fennel, pepper. 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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