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Cod B0ub6e0ise

This dish is baked cod with mushrooms, tomatoes, shallot, butter, and lemon, cooked in a paper bag.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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, fish (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Prepare

  1. Lay the cod slices in a well-buttered paper bag.

  2. Season with coarse sea salt and black pepper.

  3. Place the mushrooms and sliced tomatoes on top of the fish.

  4. Add the chopped shallot and dot with butter.

  5. Squeeze lemon juice over the top.

Bake and serve

  1. Seal the bag and cook for 15 minutes in a 300°F (150°C) oven.

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. Mushroom + buttertop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together12,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Mushroom + shallottop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together1,960 recipes

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

  4. Mushroom + tomatotop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together2,718 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans,trans-2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  5. Pepper + tomatotop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together17,913 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Cod
Forms the flaky main protein that gently cooks in its own steam.
Mushrooms
Release moisture as they cook, adding savoury depth to the juices in the bag.
Tomatoes
Break down slightly in the heat, adding moisture and gentle acidity to the sauce.
Butter
Adds richness and carries flavour, helping the fish stay moist.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the fish and balances the richness of the butter.

The step that matters

Seal the bag. A tight seal traps steam so the fish cooks gently in its own moisture. A leaky bag lets steam escape, which can dry the cod and slow even cooking.

Flavor stand-ins for the shallot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, mushroom, tomato, butter, lemon):

  1. Capsicumbetter flavor fit
  2. Potatobetter flavor fit
  3. Asparagusbetter flavor fit
  4. Shallotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, mushroom, tomato, butter, lemon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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