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Fillets of Soles À LA Cardinal

Baked sole fillets served with a mixture of Cardinal sauce, savory jelly, and gravy, garnished with stewed prawns in aspic jelly and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,338 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Fillets of Soles À LA Cardinal

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 the sole

  1. Divide the sole fillet into eight pieces.

  2. Place the pieces on a buttered dish with a small amount of butter on each piece.

  3. Cover with buttered paper and another dish.

  4. Cook in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 10 minutes.

  5. Remove the fish and let it cool completely.

Make and coat

  1. In a bowl, mix the Cardinal sauce with the savory jelly and some gravy until well combined.

  2. Stir occasionally until cold but not set.

  3. Coat the sole pieces with the mixture.

  4. Let them firm up.

Arrange and serve

  1. Arrange the sole in a circle on decorative paper.

  2. Place stewed prawns mixed with aspic jelly in the center.

  3. Garnish with 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. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

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

  3. Sauce + parsleytop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,693 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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

Sole
Forms the main body of the dish, cooked gently so it stays moist and tender.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, helping the fish stay tender while it cooks.
Savory jelly
Gives the coating body and a set that holds it on the fish.
Cardinal sauce
Provides the flavour and colour of the coating, bound with the jelly.

The step that matters

Cooling the coating until cold but not set. If the sauce is still warm it will run off the fish; if it sets fully before coating, it will clump and go lumpy. Stirring gently keeps it smooth and at a spreadable thickness.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Tarragonfits about as well
  3. Parsleythe original
  4. Nutmegfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, 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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