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Bboiled Fish

Fish split and broiled with butter, served with salt, pepper, and optional sauces.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Fish and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,488 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Bboiled Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Rub a double broiler with butter or a piece of salt pork to prevent sticking.

  2. Split the fish from head to tail and clean it thoroughly.

Broil

  1. Brush each half with melted butter and place it in the broiler, flesh side first.

  2. Cook over a clear fire for 20-30 minutes, depending on thickness.

Serve

  1. Serve with salt, pepper, and butter, or with sauces like Beurre noir or Tartare.

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

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

  2. Fish + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,948 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Fish
Forms the main body of the dish; its firm flesh holds together under direct heat.
Butter
Adds moisture and richness and helps the fish brown lightly while it cooks.

The step that matters

Cooking over a clear fire. Fish flesh dries out quickly under strong direct heat, so thickness changes the time needed. Watching the fish, not just the clock, helps keep it moist and evenly cooked through.

“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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