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Pike

A stewed pike served with a sauce of court bouillon, white wine, stock, anchovy essence, lemon, and roux.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and 27,039 recipes mention both. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Contains: milk, wheat, fish (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Poach the pike

  1. Place the cleaned pike in a fish kettle.

  2. Cover the pike with hot court bouillon and white wine.

  3. Stew gently until the pike is cooked through.

  4. Drain the pike and scale it thoroughly.

Make the sauce

  1. In a clean pan, combine the pike with some of the cooking liquid and ½ pint of white stock.

  2. Add salt, cayenne, essence of anchovies, and lemon juice.

  3. Thicken the sauce with roux or butter rolled in flour.

  4. Boil the sauce until smooth.

Serve

  1. Serve the pike on a hot dish, pouring some sauce over it and serving the rest separately.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Pepper + lemontop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together27,039 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  2. White wine + buttertop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together5,039 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. White wine + lemontop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together3,764 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  4. White wine + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together5,223 recipes

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

  5. Lemon + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together41,197 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Pike
The main fish, which is gently poached until cooked through and then served whole.
White stock
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, carrying the other flavourings.
Roux or butter rolled in flour
Thickens the sauce so it coats the fish and stays smooth.
Essence of anchovies
Adds a savoury, salty depth to the sauce.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich, buttery sauce.

The step that matters

Boil the sauce until smooth. Flour-based thickeners must be fully cooked and kept moving; if the sauce is not boiled briefly, the starch stays raw and tastes floury, and lumps can form if the thickener is added too quickly.

“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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