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Baked Halibut

A baked halibut served with a sauce of catsup, roux, and claret.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 42,912 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Baked Halibut

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Soak the halibut in cold saltwater for 1 hour to remove fish oil flavor.

  2. Wipe the fish dry, score the skin, and place it in a baking pan.

  3. Pour boiling water over the fish.

  4. Cover the pan.

Bake and baste

  1. Bake for 12 minutes per pound.

  2. Baste with melted butter and lemon juice mixed with onion juice four times.

  3. Transfer the fish to a hot dish.

  4. Keep warm over boiling water.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. Stir catsup and brown roux into the remaining liquid.

  2. Add hot water if too thick.

  3. Add claret.

  4. Strain some sauce over the fish.

  5. Serve the rest in a gravy boat.

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 + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

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

  3. Lemon + oniontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,646 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Halibut
Forms the main body of the dish, cooked gently by baking in boiling water.
Melted butter
Adds richness and moisture while basting the fish's surface.
Brown roux
Thickens the pan liquid into a smooth, body-rich sauce.
Claret
Adds acidity and wine flavor to the finished sauce.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the buttery basting mixture.

The step that matters

Bake for 12 minutes per pound. Fish is done when it turns opaque and flakes easily; overbaking dries the flesh because proteins tighten and release moisture. Check early, since thickness varies.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, onion):

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Mangofits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, onion. 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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