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Pepper Pot

A stew of fish, meat, poultry, and vegetables simmered with chilis or cayenne pepper and coarse sea salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Fish and meat work together. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 479 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Pepper Pot

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In an earthen pot, combine fish, meat, poultry, and vegetables.

  2. Season with chilis or Cayenne pepper and coarse sea salt.

Simmer

  1. Place the pot by the fire and let it simmer without boiling.

  2. Occasionally skim the surface and add water if it gets too dry.

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. Fish + meattop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together479 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  2. Meat + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,777 recipes

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

  3. Fish + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,948 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Fish
Adds savory protein and flavor that builds the body of the stew.
Meat
Contributes rich flavor and tender texture after slow simmering.
Poultry
Adds savory flavor and tender texture to the stew.
Vegetables
Contribute moisture, body and mild sweetness to the broth.
Chilis or cayenne pepper
Provides heat that gives the stew its characteristic peppery bite.

The step that matters

Simmer without boiling. A rolling boil toughens proteins and can make meat and fish dry and stringy, while a gentle simmer keeps them tender. Skimming and adding water as needed keeps the broth balanced.

“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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