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Turbot and Halibut

A boiled fish dish featuring turbot or halibut served with boiled potatoes, fresh butter, parsley, and quartered lemons.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Turbot and Halibut

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the fish in milk for improved appearance.

  2. Place the fish in a pot with cold water, salt, and whole pepper.

Cook

  1. Bring to a boil for a few seconds, then reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes.

Serve

  1. Transfer the fish to a plate, garnish with parsley and quartered lemons.

  2. Serve with boiled potatoes and fresh butter.

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 + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

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

  3. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Parsley + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

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

  5. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 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

Turbot or halibut
Forms the main body of the dish; its firm, flaky flesh holds together when poached.
Fresh butter
Adds richness and moisture as a serving accompaniment.

The step that matters

Simmer gently after the brief boil. Once the water reaches a boil, lowering the heat to a simmer cooks the fish gently. A hard boil can toughen the flesh and break it apart.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turbot, milk, pepper, parsley, lemon, butter):

  1. Shallotfits about as well
  2. Potatothe original
  3. Carrotfits about as well
  4. Leekfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against turbot, milk, pepper, parsley, lemon, butter. 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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