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Sauce

White Sauce for Fish

A creamy sauce made with anchovies, wine, vinegar, onion, butter, flour, milk, mushroom ketchup, and cayenne.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

White Sauce for Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Make the anchovy liquid

  1. Combine minced anchovies, light wine, vinegar, onion, and clove in a clean saucepan. Simmer gently until anchovies dissolve.

  2. Strain the liquid.

Make the roux and sauce

  1. In another saucepan, mix 2 teaspoons flour with a slice of butter and cook thoroughly.

  2. Add ¼ pint milk or cream and stir over gentle heat until thickened.

  3. Remove from heat and add the strained liquid.

  4. Melt ½ ounce butter in a saucepan and stir in 1 ounce flour.

  5. Add ½ pint cream or milk, 2 tablespoons mushroom ketchup, 1 teaspoon essence of anchovy, and a pinch of cayenne.

  6. Stir over heat for 1-2 minutes and serve.

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 + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

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

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Wine + vinegartop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,493 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  5. Onion + clovetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,901 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Flour
Thickens the butter and milk into a smooth, stable sauce base.
Butter
Carries the flour for the roux and adds richness to the sauce.
Milk or cream
Forms the liquid body of the sauce and adds richness and smoothness.
Anchovies
Provide the savoury, salty depth that defines the fish sauce.

The step that matters

Cooking the flour into the butter. Flour must be cooked in the fat until it loses its raw taste and thickens evenly. Skipping this leaves a pasty flavour and can cause lumps when liquid is added.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (wine, vinegar, onion, flour, butter, milk, cream):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Cinnamonfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against wine, vinegar, onion, flour, butter, milk, cream. 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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