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Baked Haddocks

A baked haddock dish simmered in a sauce of fish stock, anchovies, ketchup, vinegar, soy sauce, and wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Haddock and ketchup share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 23 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Baked Haddocks

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Make the stock

  1. Simmer haddock heads and trimmings with onion, parsley, salt, pepper, and anchovies for 30 minutes.

  2. Strain the stock.

Make the sauce

  1. Melt butter in a saucepan and whisk in flour until smooth.

  2. Gradually add the strained stock, stirring until thickened.

  3. Stir in ketchup, vinegar, soy sauce, and white wine. Heat through.

Bake and serve

  1. Place haddock pieces in a deep dish and pour the sauce over them.

  2. Bake in a preheated oven at 350°F (175°C) for 20-25 minutes or until cooked through.

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. Haddock + ketchuptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together23 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  4. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  5. Fish + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,488 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Haddock
Provides the flaky white fish that cooks through in the sauce and forms the main body of the dish.
Butter and flour
Form a roux that thickens the stock into a smooth, coating sauce.
Anchovies
Add a salty, savoury depth to the stock that rounds out the sauce.
White wine
Adds acidity and aroma that brighten the rich sauce.

The step that matters

Whisking the flour into the melted butter. Flour must be fully incorporated into the fat before liquid is added; otherwise lumps form and the sauce thickens unevenly, because starch granules need to be coated by fat to disperse smoothly.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, haddock, parsley, pepper, butter, flour, ketchup):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, haddock, parsley, pepper, butter, flour, ketchup. 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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