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Broiled Cod

Broiled cod fillets seasoned with salt, pepper, butter, and mustard, then broiled and served.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,430 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Broiled Cod

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the cod fillets in hot water for a few minutes.

  2. Remove the fillets.

  3. Rub the fillets with coarse sea salt to clean off the skin and dirt.

  4. Boil the cleaned fillets in water until cooked through.

  5. Remove the fillets.

Season and broil

  1. Season the fillets with black pepper and salt.

  2. Broil the fillets until golden brown.

Serve

  1. Serve the broiled cod on a dish.

  2. Pour melted butter and mustard over the cod.

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 + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

  3. Butter + mustardtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,003 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Cod fillets
Forms the main body of the dish and cooks to a flaky texture.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a silky mouthfeel as it coats the fish.
Mustard
Adds a sharp, tangy flavour that balances the richness of the butter.

The step that matters

Broil the fillets until golden brown.. Cod is lean and thin fillets cook fast under direct high heat. Browning and drying happen quickly, so the fish can turn dry and tough if left too long. Check it often and remove it as soon as it is opaque and flakes easily.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, butter. 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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