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Fish Eelish

A baked casserole of fish, eggs, mashed potatoes, and roe seasoned with butter, parsley, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Fish Eelish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Dry the roe well after boiling.

  2. Mince the cold fish and season the fish with salt and pepper.

  3. Mix the roe with the drawn butter and the yolks of the boiled eggs.

  4. Cut the egg whites into thin rings.

Assemble and bake

  1. Layer mashed potatoes at the bottom of a greased baking dish.

  2. Add layers of fish, drawn butter, and egg white rings.

  3. Add more mashed potatoes on top.

  4. Cover the dish.

  5. Bake until it smokes and bubbles.

  6. Remove the cover for a few minutes to brown the top.

Serve

  1. Serve in the baking dish with pickles.

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 + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

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

  3. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  4. Butter + fishtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,488 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  5. Butter + potatotop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

What each ingredient does

Drawn butter
Adds richness and moisture, coating the fish and potato layers as they bake.
Mashed potato
Forms the bulk of the layers and holds moisture so the dish stays soft.
Cold fish
Provides the main flavour and body of the dish as the filling.
Hard boiled eggs
Yolks blend with the roe and butter to enrich the filling; whites add texture as rings.
Roe
Adds a rich, savoury flavour and a firm, briny texture to the filling.

The step that matters

Remove the cover to brown the top. Covering traps steam so the top stays pale and soft; uncovering for a few minutes lets surface moisture evaporate and the proteins and sugars brown, giving colour and flavour.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, egg, fish, roe, parsley, pepper):

  1. Potatothe original
  2. Chivefits about as well
  3. Shallotfits about as well
  4. Capsicumfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, egg, fish, roe, parsley, pepper. 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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