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To Collar Eels

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 507 recipes. Both carry 2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

To Collar Eels

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Clean the eels by cutting off the head, splitting them open, and removing the bone.

  2. Lay the fish flat and season with mixed spices, parsley, and sage.

  3. Roll the eels tightly in a cloth and bind securely.

  4. Boil the eels in salted water for 45 minutes.

  5. Hang the eels to dry overnight.

  6. Prepare the pickle by boiling vinegar with peppercorns and marjoram for 10 minutes, then let it stand overnight.

  7. Remove the cloth from the eels and place them in the pickle.

  8. Serve whole or sliced, garnished with parsley.

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. Sage + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together507 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Parsley + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Parsley + sagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,445 recipes

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

  4. Parsley + vinegartop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,477 recipes

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

  5. Vinegar + marjoramtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together421 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Rosemaryfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sage, vinegar, marjoram. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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