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Salt Fish Souffle

A baked potato and salt fish souffle with a folded egg white topping.

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

Salt Fish Souffle

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the base

  1. Peel and boil the potatoes for 30 minutes. Drain and mash them finely.

  2. Mix the mashed potatoes with the chopped salt fish, hot milk, butter, salt, and pepper.

  3. Beat 2 eggs and stir them into the mixture.

Bake and serve

  1. Heap the mixture onto a serving dish and bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 10 minutes.

  2. Beat the egg whites to stiff peaks, add ¼ teaspoon salt, and then fold in the yolks.

  3. Spread the egg mixture over the fish mixture and brown in the oven. 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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

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

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

  5. Fish + milktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,432 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Form the bulk and soft body of the soufflé base.
Salt fish
Provides the salty, savoury flavour that anchors the dish.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and help it set as it bakes.
Egg whites
Whipped air bubbles lighten the top and help it rise.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smoother texture.
Hot milk
Adds moisture and loosens the mashed potato for mixing.

The step that matters

Whipping and folding the egg whites. Beat the whites to stiff peaks and fold gently so the trapped air is kept. The air expands in the oven heat and lifts the top, while overmixing deflates it and leaves a dense result.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, milk, butter, pepper, egg):

  1. Potatothe original
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Asparagusfits less well
  4. Chivefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, milk, butter, pepper, egg. 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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