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Shred Codfish

A simple shredded codfish dish cooked with butter, flour, and boiling water, optionally finished with beaten egg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Shred Codfish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the codfish

  1. Flake the codfish very finely.

  2. Wash the flaked codfish in two waters.

  3. Squeeze the codfish tightly to remove excess water.

Make the shredded codfish

  1. In a saucepan, combine the codfish, butter, and flour, mixing thoroughly.

  2. Slowly add the boiling water, stirring continuously until it comes to a boil.

  3. If desired, stir in a well-beaten egg just before removing from heat.

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 + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Butter and flour 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

Codfish
Provides the main flavour and the flaky, shredded texture of the dish.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, carrying flavour through the codfish.
Flour
Thickens the mixture as it cooks with the water, giving it a smooth body.
Egg
Adds richness and helps bind the mixture when stirred in before serving.

The step that matters

Slowly add the boiling water. Adding the water gradually while stirring keeps the flour from forming lumps, so the mixture thickens smoothly as it comes to a boil.

“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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