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Fish Soup Cake

A fried fish cake stewed in a broth of fish bones, onion, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Fish Soup Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cake

  1. Remove bones and skin from the cold boiled fish and weigh it.

  2. Add grated bread crumbs, melted butter, minced onion, pepper, salt, and egg whites to the fish. Mix well.

  3. Shape into a thick cake the size of the serving dish.

  4. Fry the cake on both sides until golden brown.

Stew and finish the sauce

  1. Stew the cake in weak stock made with fish bones, onion, pepper, and salt.

  2. Thicken the sauce with flour and water.

  3. Add mushroom catsup and soy sauce.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Bread + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Onion + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,626 recipes

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

  5. Fish + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Cold boiled white fish
Forms the body of the cake and gives it its flaked, tender texture.
Egg whites
Bind the fish together so the cake holds its shape when fried.
Grated bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and help the mixture hold together as a cake.
Melted butter
Adds richness and helps the outside brown when fried.
Flour and water
Thicken the stock into a sauce that coats the cake.

The step that matters

Frying the cake on both sides until golden brown. The cake is held together only by bread crumbs and egg white, so it can break apart if handled roughly or turned too early. Letting a firm crust form before turning helps it hold its shape, and browning adds flavour.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, bread, butter, pepper, egg, flour, mushroom):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, bread, butter, pepper, egg, flour, mushroom. 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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