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Grenadier De Fil Et De Sole.— Sole with Forcemeat and Gherkins

A sole fillet stuffed with forcemeat and gherkins, baked with a weak gravy and served with caper vinegar and gherkin liquor.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 18 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Grenadier De Fil Et De Sole.— Sole with Forcemeat and Gherkins

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the fish

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Split the sole down the middle and remove the bone.

  3. Lard the inside with strips of gherkins and truffles.

  4. Cover one half of the sole with the forcemeat and place the other half on top.

  5. Fasten the two halves together with four skewers.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake with the weak gravy for about 20 minutes.

  2. Keep the fish warm while warming the gravy with caper vinegar and gherkin liquor.

  3. Serve the fish with the warmed gravy and sliced gherkins.

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. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  2. Fish + anchovytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together637 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Fish + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Bread + anchovytop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,260 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanol (green, fruity).

  5. Meat + fishtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together479 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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, holding the forcemeat between its two halves.
Forcemeat
Fills the fish and gives a soft, moist, savoury texture as it cooks.
Eggs
Bind the forcemeat and help it set firm when baked.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and add body to the forcemeat, keeping it tender.
Weak meat or fish gravy
Keeps the fish moist during baking and forms the sauce served with it.

The step that matters

Fastening the two halves. If the skewered halves are not closed snugly, the forcemeat can leak or shift during baking, leaving the filling uneven and the fish dry at the edges.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (truffle, meat, fish, bread, egg, anchovy, parsley):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Nutmegfits about as well
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against truffle, meat, fish, bread, egg, anchovy, parsley. 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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