Why it works: Fish and pork work together. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 668 recipes. Both carry 4-heptenal, which smells creamy, biscuit. The science ↓
Broiled Fish
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Slice or split the fish into pieces and wash it.
Wrap the fish in a towel to dry.
Rub the fish with salt, pepper, and meal.
Cook and serve
Place the fish on a grill or in a pan with fried salt pork.
Brown the fish on both sides.
Butter the fish well and serve with egg or oyster sauce.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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.
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Fish + porktop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together668 recipes
Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).
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Fish + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,488 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Pork + buttertop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together13,933 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
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Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour and butter 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
- Fish
- Is the main protein that is cooked and browned.
- Meal
- Forms a light coating that helps the surface brown during cooking.
- Butter
- Adds richness and fat that finishes the fish with flavour.
- Salt pork
- Renders fat into the pan and adds savoury flavour to the fish.
The step that matters
Drying the fish before seasoning. Removing surface water lets the fish brown rather than steam, and helps the meal coating stick evenly before cooking.
“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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