Why it works: Haddock and butter work together. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 764 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓
Haddock, to Dry
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the fish
Remove the gills, eyes, and entrails from the haddock, and clean the blood from the backbone.
Wipe the fish dry and sprinkle salt inside the bodies and eyes.
Place the fish on a board and let them sit overnight.
Hang the fish in a dry place for three to four days until ready to eat.
Coat and cook
Skin the fish, rub them with egg, and coat with breadcrumbs.
Place the fish before the fire and baste with butter until browned.
Serve with egg sauce.
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.
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Haddock + buttertop 16% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together764 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Haddock + eggtop 28% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together492 recipes
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Haddock
- Is the main body of the dish, firm enough to hang and dry over several days.
- Egg
- Acts as a binder so the breadcrumbs adhere to the skinned fish.
- Breadcrumbs
- Form a crisp, golden crust when the fish is cooked.
- Butter
- Adds richness and helps the coating brown as the fish cooks.
The step that matters
Hanging the fish to dry. Drying draws moisture out of the flesh and concentrates flavor, while salt slows spoilage. Too little time or a humid place can leave the fish unevenly cured or spoiled, so the dry, airy spot matters.
“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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