Skip to main content
Main

Fricandeau of Cod

A baked cod dish mixed with oyster sauce, anchovy sauce, spices, and bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Fricandeau of Cod

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Bone the remains of cold cod.

  2. Mix the cod with oyster sauce or tinned oysters, anchovy sauce, spice, cayenne pepper, and salt.

  3. Soak the bread slices in milk, mash them, and mix with the fish mixture.

Bake and serve

  1. Place the mixture in a buttered tin.

  2. Strew bread crumbs on top and add dabs of butter.

  3. Bake for one hour.

  4. Turn out of the tin and serve.

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. Anchovy + saucetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Oyster + anchovytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together603 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Anchovy + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,260 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanol (green, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Remains of cold cod
Provides the flaked fish that forms the body of the dish.
Several slices of bread
Soaked in milk and mashed, it binds the fish and keeps the mixture moist.
Milk
Softens the bread so it blends smoothly into the fish mixture.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the top brown during baking.
Bread crumbs
Forms a crisp, golden topping that browns in the oven.
Oyster sauce or tinned oysters
Adds a savoury, briny depth of flavour to the fish.

The step that matters

Mashing the soaked bread into the fish. The bread must be thoroughly mashed and evenly mixed so it binds the fish. Lumps of dry or unevenly soaked bread leave dense pockets and an uneven texture in the baked dish.

“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.

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesWhite BreadWhite Bread80 recipesBread OmeletteBread Omelette60 recipesOatmeal BreadOatmeal Bread51 recipes