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Potted Fish

A fish preserved in a jar with salt, spices, flour, butter, vinegar, and water, baked for six hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Potted Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Soak the fish in salt water for several hours.

  2. Cut the fish into slices.

Layer and bake

  1. In a jar, layer the fish, spices, flour, and bits of butter, repeating until filled.

  2. Combine vinegar and water in equal parts and fill the jar.

  3. Cover the jar tightly with a floured cloth to prevent steam from escaping.

  4. Bake for 6 hours.

Cool and serve

  1. Allow the fish to cool in the jar, then cut into slices and serve for tea.

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. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Flour + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,341 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Pepper + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,890 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Fish (in the method)
Forms the main body of the dish, becoming tender during the long, slow bake.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture as it melts through the layers during baking.
Vinegar
Adds acidity and helps preserve the fish along with the salt.
Cloves
Contributes warm aroma and spice flavour to the fish.
Cinnamon
Contributes sweet, warm aroma and spice flavour to the fish.

The step that matters

Covering the jar tightly. A tight floured cloth keeps steam inside the jar, so the fish cooks in its own moisture and the liquid stays in contact with it. If steam escapes, the fish can dry out during the long bake.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, flour, cinnamon, butter, vinegar):

  1. Nutmegfits about as well
  2. Allspicefits about as well
  3. Clovethe original
  4. Tarragonfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, flour, cinnamon, butter, vinegar. 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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