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Jellied Fish

A dish of cooked white fish set in gelatin, served with lettuce and tartar sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Gelatin and sauce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 104 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Jellied Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Boil the fish in well-salted water until thoroughly cooked.

  2. Remove the skin and bones, preserving the shape of the fish.

  3. Place the fish on a platter with the head and tail intact, and sprinkle with whole peppercorns and bay leaves.

Make the gelatin

  1. Soak the gelatin for 1 hour, then pour 1 quart of hot fish stock over it.

  2. Pour the gelatin mixture over the fish and set it on ice.

Serve

  1. When ready to serve, loosen the edges of the gelatin and place it under and around the fish with crisp lettuce leaves.

  2. Pour sauce Tartare over the entire dish.

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. Gelatin + saucetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together104 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Fish + lettucetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together196 recipes

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

  3. Lettuce + saucetop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,019 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Fish + saucetop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,487 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Gelatin + lettucetop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together128 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

White fish
Forms the main body of the dish and is set in the clear gelatin.
Gelatin
Sets the fish stock into a firm jelly that holds the fish in place.
Fish stock
Dissolves the gelatin and supplies the savory liquid that becomes the jelly.
Bay leaves
Adds a subtle aromatic flavour to the poaching and jelly.

The step that matters

Pour the gelatin mixture over the fish and set it on ice. Gelatin only sets properly when fully dissolved in hot liquid and then cooled. Chilling it slowly and evenly on ice gives a clear, firm jelly rather than a cloudy or soft one.

Swap the lettuce

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, gelatin, sauce):

  1. Horseradishfits about as well
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Tomatofits about as well
  4. Lettucethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, gelatin, sauce. 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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