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Turbot

A fried turbot served with a sauce of claret, white wine, anchovy, butter, lemon, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Turbot and anchovy match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 110 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-ol, which smells mushroom, earthy. The science ↓

Turbot

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and fry

  1. Dust the cleaned and dried turbot with flour.

  2. Heat enough hot lard in a pan to cover the fish.

  3. Fry the turbot until it is nice and brown.

  4. Carefully remove the turbot and drain the fat.

Make the sauce

  1. In the same pan, add claret, white wine, anchovy, salt, nutmeg, and ginger to nearly cover the fish.

  2. Return the turbot to the pan and let it simmer until the liquid is reduced by half.

  3. Add the butter rolled in flour and minced lemon, and simmer until the sauce thickens.

Serve

  1. Rub a hot dish with shallot, place the turbot in the dish, pour the sauce over it, 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. Turbot + anchovytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together110 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  2. Ginger + lemontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,154 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Nutmeg + gingertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,324 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Nutmeg + lemontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Turbot
Is the main fish, which browns in the lard and becomes tender as it simmers in the sauce.
Butter rolled in flour
Flour and butter form a roux that thickens the sauce as it simmers.
Claret
Red wine forms the base of the sauce and adds acidity and colour.
White wine
Adds acidity and body to the sauce as it reduces.
Anchovy
Melts into the sauce, adding savoury depth without a fishy taste.
Lemon
Adds bright acidity that balances the rich wine and butter sauce.

The step that matters

Simmering the turbot in the reduced sauce. Simmering only until the liquid is reduced by half, then thickening gently, keeps the fish moist and tender. Boiling hard would toughen the flesh and can break the butter and flour thickening into a greasy, grainy sauce.

Swap the ginger

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turbot, flour, white wine, anchovy, nutmeg, butter, lemon):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against turbot, flour, white wine, anchovy, nutmeg, butter, lemon. 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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