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Codfish in Cream

A creamy codfish dish made with butter, flour, milk, and eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Codfish in Cream

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the codfish

  1. Wash the salt codfish.

  2. Soak it in cold water overnight.

  3. Pick it apart.

  4. Cover it with boiling water.

  5. Bring to a boil.

  6. Drain.

  7. Cover again with boiling water.

  8. Cook slowly for about 10 minutes.

  9. Drain again.

Make the cream sauce

  1. In a saucepan, melt the butter and flour together until smooth.

  2. Add the milk.

  3. Stir until boiling.

Combine and serve

  1. Add the codfish.

  2. Stand over hot water for 10 minutes.

  3. Add the eggs.

  4. Serve immediately.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Salt codfish
Provides the main flavour and the flaky body of the dish.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavour through the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the butter and milk into a smooth, stable cream sauce.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the cream sauce and gives it its creamy texture.
Eggs
Add richness and help bind the sauce as they set gently with heat.

The step that matters

Stir until boiling, then add the codfish. Flour must be cooked smooth into the butter and milk to thicken the sauce fully. Lumps are hard to remove later, so stirring steadily while the sauce comes to a boil keeps it even and creamy.

“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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