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To Plank Fish

Fish cooked on a heated wooden plank with salt, pepper, butter, and lemon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

To Plank Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Prepare the fish by splitting it down the back and cleaning it carefully.

  2. Preheat the plank in a broiling oven for about 10 minutes.

Cook

  1. Place the fish on the heated plank, skin-side down.

  2. Sprinkle the fish with salt and pepper, then baste lightly with melted butter and lemon juice.

  3. Insert the plank into the broiling oven, positioning it about 6 inches from the flame.

  4. Cook until the fish is nicely browned and tender, about 15 to 20 minutes, watching carefully to prevent scorching.

Serve

  1. When done, baste again with melted butter, garnish with lemon and parsley, and 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. Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  5. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

What each ingredient does

Shad or white fish
Forms the main body of the dish, cooking to tender, flaky flesh with a browned surface.
Melted butter
Adds fat and moisture that keeps the fish from drying and helps it brown.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor of the rich fish and butter.

The step that matters

Watching the fish while it cooks. Sugars and proteins on the wood and fish surface can scorch quickly under the broiler's intense direct heat. Keeping the plank about 6 inches from the flame and checking often helps the fish brown evenly and turn tender before it burns.

“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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