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Shad-roe

Broiled shad roe served with butter, lemon juice, parsley, pepper, salt, and garnished with cucumbers, tomatoes, or watercress, accompanied by mashed potatoes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and parsley 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 ↓

Shad-roe

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and cook

  1. Wash the shad-roe in cold water and dry it with a clean towel.

  2. Place the shad-roe between the bars of a buttered double wire gridiron.

  3. Broil the shad-roe until brown on both sides.

Serve

  1. Serve with butter, lemon juice, and parsley, or with plain butter, pepper, and salt.

  2. Garnish with sliced cucumbers, tomatoes, or watercress, and serve with mashed potatoes.

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. Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + watercresstop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together469 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Cucumber + watercresstop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together140 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

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

  5. Lemon + watercresstop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together579 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Shad-roe
The main protein, which firms and browns under the broiler while staying moist inside.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the roe brown on the gridiron and carries flavour when served.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich roe and cuts through the butter.

The step that matters

Broil until brown on both sides. Roe is delicate and can dry out or break apart if overcooked. Browning both sides evenly, with the gridiron holding it flat, gives a firm exterior while the inside stays tender.

Swap the cucumber

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (roe, butter, lemon, parsley, pepper, watercress, potato):

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Horseradishfits better
  4. Cucumberthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against roe, butter, lemon, parsley, pepper, watercress, potato. 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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