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Breaded Fish

Breaded fish is a dish of fish pieces coated in egg and bread crumbs, then fried.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Fish and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,668 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓

Breaded Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the fish into pieces about 4 inches long and 3 inches wide.

  2. Season the fish pieces with salt and pepper.

  3. Dip each piece in the beaten egg, then roll in dried bread crumbs.

  4. Arrange the fish in the frying basket without stacking them.

Fry and serve

  1. Heat Cottolene until it produces blue smoke, then fry the fish for 3.5 minutes.

  2. Serve with tartar sauce or black butter.

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. Fish + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  2. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Fish + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,948 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Fish + eggtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,782 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg
Binds the bread crumbs to the fish so the coating adheres during frying.
Dried bread crumbs
Form a crisp, browned coating that protects the fish while it fries.

The step that matters

Heating the frying fat until it smokes. Fat that is not hot enough lets the coating absorb oil and turn greasy, while the fish cooks unevenly. Frying in properly hot fat sets the crumb quickly and browns it.

“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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