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Broiled Smelts

Smelts are broiled with butter, salt, pepper, cayenne, and optional bacon, served with lemon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Broiled Smelts

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the smelts in cold salted water and dry them on a clean towel.

  2. Dip the smelts in melted butter seasoned with salt, pepper, and a dust of cayenne.

  3. Place the smelts between the bars of a double wire gridiron.

Broil and serve

  1. Broil the smelts over a hot fire for about 8 minutes, or 5 minutes if they are small.

  2. Serve the smelts on a hot dish with sliced lemon.

  3. Alternatively, lay the smelts between very thin slices of bacon and broil them, serving the bacon with the fish.

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

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

  2. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

  4. Smelt + lemontop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together156 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Smelt + buttertop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together198 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Smelts
The main fish, cooked whole so its delicate flesh sets quickly over high heat.
Melted butter
Carries the seasoning and adds richness and moisture, helping the fish stay tender under the heat.
Bacon
Optional wrap that bastes the fish with its fat and adds savoury flavour as it crisps.

The step that matters

Broil over a hot fire for the right time. Smelts are small and thin, so they cook fast. Too long over high heat dries the flesh and toughens it, while too short leaves the centre undercooked. Smaller fish need the shorter time.

“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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