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Stewed Carp

A carp stewed in gravy, claret, spices, and lemon, served with fried bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Shallot and radish share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Stewed Carp

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the sauce

  1. In a pan, combine gravy and claret to cover the carp.

  2. Add mace, whole pepper, cloves, anchovies, shallot, horse-radish, and salt.

Cook and thicken

  1. Cook the carp until done, then remove it from the pan.

  2. Boil the remaining liquid until it thickens slightly.

  3. Stir in a bit of butter to thicken the sauce.

  4. Squeeze the juice of one lemon into the sauce and pour it over the carp.

Serve

  1. Serve with fried bread, fried roe, and garnish with horse-radish and lemon.

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 + radishtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

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

  3. Horse + radishtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together529 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  4. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Carp
Is the main protein, cooked gently in the seasoned liquid until done.
Butter
Enriches and thickens the reduced liquid into a smoother, glossy sauce.
Lemon
Adds acidity that brightens the rich sauce and balances its savoury flavours.
Anchovies
Contribute deep savoury flavour that rounds out the sauce.
Horse-radish
Adds sharp, pungent heat that cuts through the richness of the fish.

The step that matters

Boil the remaining liquid until it thickens slightly. Reducing the liquid concentrates its flavour and body. Boiling too long can over-reduce it into a salty, syrupy sauce, so stop once it just thickens before adding butter.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, clove, shallot, horse, radish, lemon, butter):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, clove, shallot, horse, radish, lemon, butter. 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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