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Baked Halibut

A baked halibut fillet served with butter or salt pork and pea purée garnish.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and pork are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,933 recipes. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓

Baked Halibut

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Select a solid piece of halibut weighing about 3 pounds.

  2. Marinate the halibut for about 1 hour, then drain.

  3. Brush the halibut with butter or cover the top with slices of salt pork.

Bake

  1. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for about 40 minutes, basting every 10 minutes.

Serve

  1. Remove the skin and slide the fish onto a serving dish.

  2. Garnish with a purée of peas and serve with sauces for baked 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. Butter + porktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,933 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  2. Pork + peastop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,589 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + peastop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,331 recipes

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

  4. Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,121 recipes

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

  5. Butter + peastop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,887 recipes

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

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, setting into flakes as the proteins cook.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, helping the surface stay tender and lightly browned.
Salt pork
Adds fat and savoury flavour that slowly melts into the fish as it bakes.

The step that matters

Basting during the bake. Halibut is lean and dries out quickly once its flakes set. Basting every 10 minutes replaces surface moisture and fat, keeping the fish moist while it cooks through.

Swap the peas

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

  1. Beansfits better
  2. Soybeanfits better
  3. Lima beansfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, pork, pepper. 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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