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Sturgeon, Boiled

A boiled sturgeon served with a velouté sauce thickened with egg yolks and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Sturgeon, Boiled

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Cut the sturgeon into thin slices like veal cutlets.

  2. Rub the slices with a little butter and sprinkle with pepper.

  3. Remove the skin from the fish before boiling to avoid a rank flavor.

  4. Boil the sturgeon in salt and water until done, then drain.

Make the sauce

  1. In a small saucepan, reduce ½ cup of elder vinegar until half the volume remains.

  2. Add a proportionate amount of velouté sauce and ½ teaspoon of caviar.

  3. Thicken the sauce with 3 egg yolks and stir in ½ cup of butter, salt, and pepper.

  4. Cover the drained fish with the sauce and mix in a little thick cream to keep it thick and white.

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. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Sauce + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Sturgeon + saucetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together93 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

  5. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Sturgeon
Forms the main body of the dish, providing the flesh that is sliced and boiled.
Egg yolks
Thicken the sauce as they set with gentle heat, giving it body and a smooth texture.
Butter
Adds richness and smoothness to the sauce, rounding out the sharp vinegar.
Elder vinegar
Reduced in the pan to add concentrated acidity that sharpens the sauce.
Thick cream
Adds moisture and richness, helping keep the sauce thick and pale.

The step that matters

Thicken the sauce with egg yolks. Egg yolks set when heated, but if the sauce gets too hot they can scramble and turn grainy. Gentle heat and constant stirring keep the sauce smooth and thick.

“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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