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Fish Mooloo

A fish dish simmered with coconut water, chilies, garlic, onions, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,038 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Fish Mooloo

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Fry the fish.

  2. Let the fish cool.

Make the coconut milk

  1. Scrape a coconut and mix with 1 teacup of hot water.

  2. Strain the mixture and set aside.

  3. Add 2 more tablespoons of water to the coconut.

  4. Strain the mixture again.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. In a pan, fry the chilies, garlic, and onions in ghee.

  2. Add the last straining of coconut water.

  3. Cook until dry.

  4. Pour in the first coconut water.

  5. Add vinegar, ginger, pepper, and salt.

  6. Pour the mixture over the cooled 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. Clove + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Garlic + oniontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together29,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  3. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Garlic + gingertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,402 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Garlic + peppertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,090 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

What each ingredient does

Fish
The main protein, fried first and then coated with the sauce.
Coconut (in the method)
Provides creamy body and rich, mild sweetness to the sauce.
Ghee
Fat for frying the aromatics, carrying flavour and adding richness.
Green chilies
Supply heat and sharp flavour to the sauce.
Onions
Add sweetness and savoury depth when fried until soft.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the sauce and balances the coconut.

The step that matters

Cook the sauce until dry. Reducing the coconut mixture until it is nearly dry concentrates flavour and lets the fat separate, so the sauce clings rather than turning watery. Stopping too early leaves a thin, diluted sauce.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, clove, garlic, ghee, vinegar, ginger, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Onionthe original
  3. Tomatofits about as well
  4. Mustardfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, clove, garlic, ghee, vinegar, ginger, 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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