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Fresh Herrings, Broiled

Broiled fresh herrings marinated in vinegar, water, and salt, served with parsley and optional melted butter, mustard, and lemon juice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Fresh Herrings, Broiled

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a bowl, mix vinegar, water, and salt.

  2. Soak the herrings in the mixture for 10 minutes.

Cook and serve

  1. Rub the gridiron bars with suet to prevent sticking.

  2. Remove the herrings and broil them over a clear fire.

  3. Serve garnished with parsley.

  4. Optionally, serve with melted butter mixed with mustard and vinegar or lemon juice.

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. Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  2. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Parsley + mustardtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,588 recipes

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

  4. Mustard + lemontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,816 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Parsley + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Herrings
Provide the main fish, which is firm enough to hold together under the heat of the broil.
Suet
Rubbed on the gridiron bars to create a thin layer of fat that keeps the fish from sticking.
Melted butter
Adds richness and fat to the optional sauce served alongside the broiled fish.
Mustard
Adds sharp, pungent flavour to the optional butter sauce.

The step that matters

Rub the gridiron bars with suet. If the bars are not greased, the fish skin and flesh will stick and tear when turned or lifted. A thin fat layer on the hot bars creates a barrier that helps the herrings release cleanly.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Broccolifits about as well
  3. Chivefits about as well
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, parsley, butter, lemon. 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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