Name: Red Mullet, Stuffed
Ingredients: 2 red mullet; 2 hard-boiled egg yolks; 2 tablespoons chopped parsley; 2 tablespoons butter; ¼ teaspoon pepper; ¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt; 1 tablespoon finely grated bread crumbs; Melted maitre d'hotel butter or maitre d'hotel sauce for serving

Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Red Mullet, Stuffed

Ingredients

2 red mullet
2 hard-boiled egg yolks
2 tablespoons chopped parsley
2 tablespoons butter
¼ teaspoon pepper
¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt
1 tablespoon finely grated bread crumbs
Melted maitre d'hotel butter or maitre d'hotel sauce for serving

Directions

Prepare

Scrape and wash the fish, then wipe them carefully.
Make a forcemeat by mixing hard-boiled yolks, parsley, butter, pepper, salt, and bread crumbs.

Stuff and cook

Fill the mullet with the stuffing and wrap the fish in buttered paper.
Broil the wrapped fish over a gentle fire for 20 to 30 minutes.
Remove the paper and serve the fish on a hot dish with melted maitre d'hotel butter or sauce.

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.

Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together34,122 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together22,662 recipes

Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
Parsley + buttertop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together28,563 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Parsley + breadtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,588 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

Red mullet: Forms the main body of the dish, carrying the stuffing and cooking as a whole fish.
Hard-boiled egg yolks: Form the creamy, crumbly base of the forcemeat, adding richness and body to the stuffing.
Butter: Adds fat for richness and moisture, keeping the stuffing and fish from drying out.
Bread crumbs: Absorb moisture and give the forcemeat a firmer, more cohesive texture.

The step that matters

Broil the wrapped fish over a gentle fire. A gentle heat cooks the fish through and warms the stuffing without drying the flesh or scorching the buttered paper. Too fierce a fire can burn the paper before the fish is cooked.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, butter, pepper, bread):

Parsleythe original
Nutmegfits about as well
Sagefits less well
Tarragonfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, butter, pepper, bread. 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.

Brown Bread461 recipes

White Bread80 recipes

Bread Omelette60 recipes

Oatmeal Bread51 recipes

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Red Mullet, Stuffed