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Roiled Fresh Haddock

A whole haddock boiled in salted, vinegared water, then served with melted butter, egg yolk and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and parsley are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 28,563 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Roiled Fresh Haddock

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Scrape the fish.

  2. Remove the insides and eyes.

  3. Trim the fins and tail.

Boil the fish

  1. Fill a fish kettle or saucepan with enough cold water to just cover the fish.

  2. Add 1 tablespoon of coarse sea salt and 1 teaspoon of vinegar for every quart of water.

  3. Place the fish in the water; it will be done when the water boils for a medium-sized fish.

  4. For a large fish, allow it to boil for a few more minutes.

  5. Lift the fish out with a strainer and let it drain on top of the kettle.

Serve

  1. Remove the skewer from the head.

  2. Carefully slide the fish onto a dish lined with a folded napkin.

  3. Brush the fish with melted butter.

  4. Decorate with hard-boiled egg yolk and finely chopped parsley.

  5. Garnish with fresh parsley.

  6. Serve with your choice of sauce.

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

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

  2. Parsley + vinegartop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,477 recipes

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

  3. Haddock + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together764 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Egg + parsleytop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,765 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

Haddock
Forms the main body of the dish, cooked gently in salted water until flaky.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel when brushed over the hot fish.
Egg
Hard-boiled yolk adds a crumbly texture and mild richness as decoration.

The step that matters

Lifting the fish out when it is done. Fish overcooks quickly once the water boils, and overcooked fish becomes dry and falls apart. Timing the boil by fish size keeps the flesh moist and intact.

Swap the parsley

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against haddock, butter, egg, vinegar. 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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