Name: Baked Red Mullet in Paper Cases
Ingredients: 3 red mullet; 2 tablespoons salad oil; ⅓ cup sherry; 1 teaspoon anchovy sauce; 1 teaspoon lemon juice; ½ oz flour; ½ oz butter; salt; cayenne pepper

Why it works: Anchovy and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,057 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Baked Red Mullet in Paper Cases

Ingredients

Directions

Sprinkle each mullet with a little salt.
Cut three pieces of kitchen paper large enough to roll the fish in and oil the paper well.
Roll each fish up in a piece of the paper, tie the ends firmly, and twist the string once or twice to keep the paper together.

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.

Anchovy + saucetop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,057 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together27,047 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Anchovy + buttertop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,697 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Sherry + buttertop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,505 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

Flour and butter 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

Delicate Cake246 recipes

Boiled Frosting69 recipes

Citron Cake68 recipes

Scotch Cake63 recipes

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Baked Red Mullet in Paper Cases