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Baked Herrings and Sprats

Baked herrings and sprats seasoned with allspice, salt, cloves, pepper, onion, bay leaves, vinegar, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Baked Herrings and Sprats

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderately quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderately quick oven”. The 350°F in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Wash and drain the herrings and sprats without wiping them.

  2. Season with allspice, coarse sea salt, and whole cloves.

Bake

  1. Lay them in a pan with plenty of black pepper, an onion, and bay leaves.

  2. Add equal parts vinegar and water.

  3. Bake in a moderate oven (350°F / 175°C) until cooked through.

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. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Allspice + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  5. Clove + oniontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,901 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

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, cooking through to a tender, flaky texture.
Sprats
Add small whole fish that soften fully during baking, adding richness to the dish.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavour and helps firm and preserve the fish.
Onion
Adds savoury sweetness and aroma as it softens in the pan.

The step that matters

Add equal parts vinegar and water. Acid from the vinegar changes the fish's proteins and firms its flesh, while water dilutes it so the sharpness stays balanced. Too much vinegar can make the fish tough and sour.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against allspice, clove, pepper, 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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