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Haddock Pudding

A boiled fish pudding made from haddock, eggs, parsley, onion, pepper, salt, breadcrumbs, and veal suet.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 25,843 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Haddock Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Bone and skin the haddocks.

  2. Pound the fish in a mortar and rub through a sieve.

Make the mixture

  1. Combine the fish with eggs, parsley, chopped onion, white pepper, salt, bread crumbs, and veal suet in the mortar. Pound the mixture well together.

Cook

  1. Transfer to a shape, tie it up in a cloth, and boil for 1 hour.

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. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  2. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Parsley + white peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  4. Parsley + breadtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,588 recipes

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

  5. Onion + breadtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,676 recipes

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

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 pudding and gives it its flaky, tender texture.
Eggs
Bind the fish and crumbs together and set when cooked, giving the pudding structure.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and help the mixture hold together without becoming wet.
Veal suet or marrow
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich during boiling.

The step that matters

Pound the mixture well together. Thorough pounding breaks the fish fibres and blends the fat, eggs and crumbs into an even paste. Uneven mixing leaves pockets that can crumble or set unevenly when boiled.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (haddock, egg, parsley, onion, bread, veal):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against haddock, egg, parsley, onion, bread, veal. 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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