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To Roast Sturgeon

A roasted sturgeon served with a vegetable sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

To Roast Sturgeon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a stewpan, combine butter, salt, pepper, parsley, onion, sweet herbs, cloves, water, and vinegar.

  2. Stir over heat until lukewarm, then remove from heat.

Steep and roast

  1. Add the sturgeon to steep in the mixture until it absorbs the flavors.

  2. Roast the sturgeon and serve with a vegetable sauce of your choice.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Parsley + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Sturgeon
Is the main protein that is steeped, then roasted to a firm, cooked texture.
Butter
Adds richness and carries flavor through the steeping liquid.
Onion
Contributes savory sweetness and aroma to the steeping liquid as it softens.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and helps flavors penetrate the fish.

The step that matters

Steeping the sturgeon. Steeping lets the fish absorb the herbs, onion, and acid. Stir over heat only until lukewarm, since a hot liquid can start cooking the fish before roasting and make it dry or firm.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, pepper, parsley, clove, vinegar, sturgeon):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, pepper, parsley, clove, vinegar, sturgeon. 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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