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Red Herrings Grilled

A dish of red herrings coated in butter and breadcrumbs, broiled and garnished with parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Red Herrings Grilled

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the herrings

  1. Split the herrings lengthwise.

  2. Remove the heads and tails.

  3. Scald the herrings in boiling water.

  4. Drain them.

Coat and broil

  1. Moisten the herrings with melted butter.

  2. Sprinkle bread crumbs over them.

  3. Baste the herrings with more butter.

  4. Add another layer of bread crumbs.

  5. Sprinkle fine herbs on top.

  6. Broil the herrings.

  7. Moisten again with oil or melted butter before serving.

  8. Season with salt and pepper.

  9. Garnish with chopped parsley.

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

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

  2. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

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

  4. Bread + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,588 recipes

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

  5. Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 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

Herrings
Form the main body of the dish, cooked through under the broiler.
Melted butter
Adds moisture and richness, helping the crumbs brown and the fish stay juicy.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden crust over the fish while holding in moisture.
Fine herbs
Add aroma and savory flavor to the crumb topping.

The step that matters

Broil the herrings. Fish cooks quickly under intense heat and can dry out or burn before the crumbs brown. Keeping the crumb layers moist with butter helps them brown evenly while the flesh stays tender.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, bread, pepper):

  1. Parsleythe original
  2. Sagefits about as well
  3. Thymefits less well
  4. Nutmegfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, bread, 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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