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Pickled Herrings

Pickled herrings are cured in salt, pepper, bay leaf, mace, butter, and vinegar, then baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,814 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Pickled Herrings

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the herrings

  1. Wash the herrings in cold water with a little salt.

  2. Remove the heads and tails.

  3. Split the herrings down the back and take out the backbone.

  4. Dry the herrings well with a cloth.

Season and roll

  1. Sprinkle the herrings with black pepper and coarse sea salt.

  2. Place a piece of butter the size of a filbert on each herring.

  3. Roll up each herring starting from the head.

  4. Place the rolled herrings in a dish with the bay leaf and mace.

Cook

  1. Cover the herrings with vinegar.

  2. Cook in a slow oven at 300°F (150°C) for an hour or more.

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 + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + macetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Mace + buttertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,405 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  5. Butter + vinegartop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,513 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

Pepper and mace barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,257 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Herrings
Form the main body of the dish, becoming tender and flaky as they cook.
Vinegar
Acidity that sharpens the flavour and helps preserve the fish during pickling.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, keeping the rolled fish from drying out in the oven.
Coarse sea salt
Seasons the fish and helps draw out moisture for a firmer texture.

The step that matters

Cook in a slow oven at 300°F (150°C) for an hour or more. A low, slow oven cooks the fish gently so it becomes tender without falling apart or drying out. Cooking too hot can toughen the flesh and split the rolls before the bones soften.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, butter, vinegar. 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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