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Baking

Eels, Baked

Baked eels seasoned with cayenne, salt, parsley, herbs, veal stock, and a sauce of port wine, lemon juice, and Worcestershire.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Eels, Baked

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Wipe the eels very dry.

  2. Season with cayenne, salt, parsley, and herbs.

  3. Place the eels in a deep dish.

  4. Cover with veal stock.

Bake and finish

  1. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until tender.

  2. Skim off the fat.

  3. Remove the eels and keep warm.

  4. Stir port wine, lemon juice, and Worcestershire sauce into the sauce.

  5. Let it just boil.

  6. Pour the sauce over the eels and serve.

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. Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Veal + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  5. Parsley + vealtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,766 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Eels
Provide the main protein, which becomes tender and rich during slow baking in stock.
Veal stock
Keeps the eels moist while baking and forms the base of the sauce.
Port wine
Adds depth and a touch of sweetness to the sauce as it reduces.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich sauce and balances the fat.
Worcestershire sauce
Adds savory, tangy depth to the sauce.

The step that matters

Let it just boil. Once port, lemon juice and Worcestershire are added, the sauce should only just reach a boil. Hard boiling can drive off the wine's aroma, concentrate salt too far, and make the acidic sauce taste sharp.

“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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