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Steamed Fish

A whole fish is marinated in vinegar, salted, then steamed until the flesh separates from the bone, served with butter sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley 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 ↓

Steamed Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Place the tail of the fish in its mouth and secure it on a plate.

  2. Pour ½ pint of vinegar over the fish, seasoned with salt and pepper.

  3. Let it stand for 1 hour over ice.

Steam and serve

  1. Pour off the vinegar and place the fish in a steamer over boiling water.

  2. Steam for 20 minutes, or longer if the fish is very large.

  3. When done, the meat should easily separate from the bone.

  4. Drain well and serve on a napkin, garnished with curled parsley.

  5. Serve with drawn butter sauce.

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

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

  2. Fish + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,488 recipes

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

  3. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

  4. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Parsley + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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

Whole fish
Forms the main body of the dish, and its flesh sets to firm, flaky texture when steamed.
Vinegar
Acidity that firms the surface of the fish and sharpens its flavour during the standing period.

The step that matters

Steaming until the meat separates. Fish cooks quickly and becomes dry and tough when overcooked. The flesh is done when it parts easily from the bone, and a very large fish needs longer than the stated 20 minutes, so check it rather than relying on the time alone.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Capersfits about as well
  3. Parsleythe original
  4. Thymefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, vinegar, pepper, butter, sauce. 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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