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Stewed Carp

A fish stew made with carp, herbs, cream, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,979 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Stewed Carp

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut off the head, tail, and fins of the carp.

  2. Season the carp inside and out with salt, pepper, and powdered mace, then let it sit for 1 hour.

Stew

  1. In a stew pan, add the carp, parsley, whole onion, sweet marjoram, cream or milk, and butter.

  2. Pour in enough water to cover the carp.

  3. Cover and let it stew for 30 minutes.

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. Parsley + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + marjoramtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  5. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Carp
Is the main protein, cooked gently in liquid until it becomes tender and flaky.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, and the flour coating helps thicken the stewing liquid.
Cream or rich milk
Adds richness and body, giving the stewing liquid a smoother, creamier texture.

The step that matters

Cover and stew gently. Fish protein sets and toughens when overheated, so the carp should simmer gently under a cover rather than boil hard. Gentle heat keeps the flesh moist and tender.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, parsley, onion, marjoram, cream, butter, flour):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Sagefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, parsley, onion, marjoram, cream, butter, flour. 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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