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Whiting, Boiled

A simple boiled fish dish featuring whiting, salt water, parsley garnish, anchovy or caper sauce, and plain melted butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Whiting and anchovy share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 82 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Whiting, Boiled

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and cook

  1. Clean the whiting but do not skin them.

  2. Place the fish in a fish kettle and cover with cold water, adding the salt.

  3. Bring the water gradually to a boil and then simmer gently for about 5 minutes, longer if the fish is large.

Serve

  1. Dish the fish on a hot napkin and garnish with parsley.

  2. Serve with anchovy or caper sauce and plain melted butter.

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. Whiting + anchovytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together82 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Anchovy + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,697 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Parsley + anchovytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,702 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  4. Parsley + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Whiting + parsleytop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together330 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Whiting
Is the main protein, cooked gently in simmering water until its flesh turns opaque and firm.
Plain melted butter
Adds richness and fat that complements the mild, delicate flavour of the poached fish.

The step that matters

Bringing the water to a boil gradually, then simmering gently. Gentle heat keeps the delicate fish flesh tender and intact, while vigorous boiling can break it apart and toughen the texture.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Garlicfits less well
  4. Thymefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against whiting, anchovy, 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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