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Baked Mackerel

Baked mackerel served with a sauce of stock, wine, vinegar, anchovy sauce, Harvey sauce, Worcestershire sauce, and soy sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Shallot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,737 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Baked Mackerel

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the fish

  1. Clean the mackerel, wash them, split them open down the back, and cut into four pieces each.

  2. Layer the fish in a pie dish, adding bay leaves, cloves, peppercorns, pimento berries, and sliced shallots between layers.

Bake and serve

  1. Mix the stock, white wine, vinegar, anchovy sauce, Harvey sauce, Worcestershire sauce, and soy sauce.

  2. Pour the mixture over the fish, cover with a flat dish, and bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C).

  3. Once cooked, place the fish on a hot dish, strain the sauce over them, and let cool.

  4. Garnish with sprigs of parsley or fennel before serving.

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. Shallot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Clove + shallottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,677 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Clove + parsleytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. White wine + shallottop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together881 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Mackerel
Forms the main body of the dish, cooking tender and flaky in the baking liquid.
White wine
Adds acidity and aroma to the cooking liquid, balancing the richness of the fish.
Vinegar
Adds sharp acidity that brightens the sauce and helps flavours penetrate the fish.
Anchovy sauce
Contributes salty, savoury depth to the sauce.
Stock
Provides the liquid base that keeps the fish moist while it bakes.

The step that matters

Baking the fish under a cover. Covering the dish traps steam so the fish cooks gently in the liquid. Overbaking dries the flesh, which is why the fish should be checked as it cooks and served promptly.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (white wine, vinegar, anchovy, sauce, shallot, parsley):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against white wine, vinegar, anchovy, sauce, shallot, parsley. 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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