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Curious French Method of Dressing Salt Fish

A salted cod dish prepared with butter, onions, pepper, nutmeg, French rolls, milk, and topped with oysters and grated bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread 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 ↓

Curious French Method of Dressing Salt Fish

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.

Prepare the fish

  1. Mince the flesh of the fresh fish.

  2. Remove bones and skin from the minced fish.

  3. Boil the salt fish.

  4. Bone the boiled salt fish.

  5. Skin the boned salt fish.

  6. Mince the salt fish with soaked French rolls.

Make the filling

  1. Melt fresh butter in a pan.

  2. Sauté chopped onions in the melted butter.

  3. Add minced fish.

  4. Season the fish with pounded pepper and grated nutmeg.

  5. Mix the minced fish with fresh butter and nutmeg.

Assemble and bake

  1. Spread the mixture in a dish.

  2. Place the whole cod in the center of the dish.

  3. Add more mince around the cod.

  4. Top the dish with oysters.

  5. Pour melted butter over the oysters.

  6. Sprinkle grated bread over the butter.

  7. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven until browned.

Serve

  1. Make a sauce with milk, fresh butter, and nutmeg.

  2. Pour some sauce over the fish when done.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  4. Fish + oystertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together496 recipes

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

  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

Salt fish
Provides the main savoury, firm flesh that forms the centre of the dish.
Fresh butter
Adds richness and moisture, and browns the top of the dish.
French rolls
Soaked and minced to bind the fish mixture and add body.
Onions
Softened in butter to add sweetness and savoury depth.
Oysters
Add briny flavour and moisture to the topping as they cook.
Grated bread
Forms a crisp, browned crust over the butter topping.

The step that matters

Bake until browned. The dish is done when the top is golden. Baking long enough lets the butter and bread crust brown and dries the surface slightly, while the fish stays moist underneath.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, butter, pepper, nutmeg, milk, oyster, bread):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, butter, pepper, nutmeg, milk, oyster, bread. 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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