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Redsnapper with Tomato Sauce

A boiled red snapper served with a tomato-based sauce thickened with sweet cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and 10,173 recipes mention both. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Redsnapper with Tomato Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Scale the red snapper thoroughly.

  2. Season it inside and out with coarse sea salt and black pepper.

  3. Wrap it in a clean cloth and place it on ice overnight.

Poach the fish

  1. In a pot, bring 1 quart of water to a boil.

  2. Add the chopped celery or parsley root, onions, and carrots.

  3. Carefully place the fish in the boiling water, ensuring it is almost covered.

  4. Add a lump of fresh butter and the tomatoes.

  5. Boil the fish for 30 minutes, turning it occasionally.

  6. Check for doneness by pulling on the fins; if they come out easily, the fish is done.

  7. Remove the fish carefully and place it on a large platter.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. Strain the sauce and return it to the pot.

  2. In a small bowl, dissolve 1 teaspoon of flour in 1 cup of sweet cream.

  3. Add the mixture to the sauce.

  4. Let it boil.

  5. Garnish the fish with chopped parsley and pour some over the sauce.

  6. Optionally, thicken the sauce with the yolks of 2-3 eggs instead of cream.

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. Celery + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Celery + tomatotop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together3,377 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together16,012 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together14,555 recipes

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

  5. Carrot + tomatotop 6% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together3,606 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

Red snapper
Is the main protein that cooks through gently in the simmering liquid.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and flavour, giving the sauce its colour and body.
Sweet cream
Adds richness and fat, softening the sauce's flavour and texture.
Flour
Thickens the cream so the sauce becomes smooth and lightly body-rich.
Onions
Add sweetness and aroma to the poaching liquid.
Butter
Adds fat and a rounded, savoury richness to the sauce.

The step that matters

Boiling the fish for 30 minutes. Boiling too long toughens the flesh, while too short leaves it undercooked near the bone. Keeping the water at a steady simmer and checking the fins helps the fish cook evenly.

Flavor stand-ins for the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (snapper, pepper, celery, carrot, butter, tomato, cream):

  1. Capsicumbetter flavor fit
  2. Potatoabout as good a flavor fit
  3. Onionthe original
  4. Spinachabout as good a flavor fit

Fit is the average pairing score against snapper, pepper, celery, carrot, butter, tomato, cream. 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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