Why it works: Turbot and sauce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 248 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓
Fillet of Turbot Au Parmesaiv
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Skin, wash, and fillet the turbot into six fillets, each about 3 inches square.
Bake the fillets in butter at 400°F (200°C) for about 12 minutes.
Place the fillets in an entree dish and cover with Parmesan Sauce.
Sprinkle a little grated Parmesan on top.
Lightly brown with a salamander and serve.
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.
-
Turbot + saucetop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together248 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
-
Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together15,338 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
-
Turbot + buttertop 21% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together372 recipes
Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).
Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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
You might also like
The free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.
Tomato Soup526 recipes
Brown Bread461 recipes
Mutton Broth292 recipes
Yorkshire Pudding264 recipes