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Salt Cod and Tomatoes

A stew of salt cod, tomatoes, onions, shallots, and potatoes, finished with butter and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Salt Cod and Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the salt cod overnight.

  2. Meanwhile, boil the soaked cod in plain water until nearly half cooked, then drain.

Make the sauce

  1. In a saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat and stir in the flour until slightly browned.

  2. Add the stewed tomatoes and stir until smooth, then set aside.

  3. In the same pan, sauté the chopped onion and shallots (or garlic) in butter until fragrant.

  4. Add the strained tomato pulp and the chopped potatoes to the pan, cover, and stew until the potatoes begin to soften.

Finish and serve

  1. Add the cod to the stew one hour before serving and cook carefully to avoid scorching.

  2. Serve with croutons.

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. Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Tomato + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,798 recipes

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

  3. Flour + shallottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,081 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Onion + shallottop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 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

Salt cod
Provides the main protein and savory flavor once soaked and cooked.
Flour
Browned in butter to form a roux that thickens the stew.
Stewed tomatoes
Supply acidity, moisture and body that form the base of the sauce.
Potatoes
Soften during stewing, adding starch that thickens and gives body to the dish.
Onion
Sautéed until fragrant, adding sweetness and aroma to the base.

The step that matters

Adding the cod to the stew. Cod is already partly cooked and becomes dry and tough if overcooked, while the stew can scorch on the bottom of the pan. Gentle, low heat keeps the fish tender and the sauce from sticking.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, onion, shallot, potato):

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Kalefits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, onion, shallot, potato. 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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