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Roes, Herring, on Toast

A dish of herring roe served on hot buttered toast, seasoned with a vinegar brine and garnished with lemon, parsley, and cayenne.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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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 ↓

Roes, Herring, on Toast

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the roes

  1. Wash the soft roes of the herrings in cold salted water without breaking them.

  2. Place the roes in a deep dish.

Poach the roes

  1. In a small saucepan, combine boiling water, French vinegar, salt, peppercorns, and bay leaves.

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil, skim it, and strain it over the roes.

  3. Cover the dish with buttered paper and place it in a 400°F (200°C) oven.

  4. Cook for 10 minutes, then drain the roes.

Serve

  1. Place one roe on each piece of hot buttered toast.

  2. Squeeze a few drops of lemon juice over each roe and sprinkle with chopped parsley and cayenne pepper.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  5. Roe + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together442 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Soft herring roes
Form the main body of the dish, becoming firm and delicate when gently cooked.
French vinegar
Adds acidity to the poaching liquid, brightening the rich flavour of the roes.
Butter
Enriches the toast and adds richness that complements the roes.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity at the end, lifting the flavour of the rich roes.

The step that matters

Cooking the roes in the oven. Roes are delicate and can overcook, becoming dry or rubbery. Keeping them covered in hot liquid at a moderate oven heat for the stated time cooks them gently and keeps them moist.

“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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