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Bouillabaisse — Marseillaise or Provengal Fish Soup

Bouillabaisse is a fish soup made with assorted fish, shrimp, herbs, and wine, thickened with arrowroot.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 21,601 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Bouillabaisse — Marseillaise or Provengal Fish Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Make the shrimp stock

  1. Remove shells from shrimps and boil the shells in water for 20 minutes.

  2. Strain the liquid from the shells and let it settle. Pour off the clear liquid, discarding the sediment.

Build the broth

  1. In a stewpan, brown slices of carrot and onion in butter with a dust of flour until tender.

  2. Gradually dilute the mixture with water or broth, adding the clear shrimp liquid.

  3. Season with sugar, herbs, white wine, and nutmeg or cloves.

  4. Thicken with arrowroot, boil while stirring, and strain through a colander.

Finish and serve

  1. Add the picked shrimps and pieces of fish, heating them through without boiling.

  2. Serve with toast-dice.

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. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Shrimp + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,931 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  3. Fish + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,488 recipes

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

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Fish + shrimptop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together252 recipes

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

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Assorted fish
Provides the main body of flavor and the substance of the dish.
Shrimps
Contribute sweet, savory shellfish flavor through both the shells in the stock and the meat added at the end.
Butter
Carries flavor from the browned vegetables and adds richness to the broth.
Onion
Browns in butter to add sweetness and savory depth to the base.
White wine
Adds acidity and aromatic complexity to the broth.
Arrowroot
Thickens the broth into a smooth, glossy body without clouding it.

The step that matters

Heating the fish and shrimp without boiling. Boiling toughens delicate fish and shrimp proteins, making them dry and rubbery. Gentle heat keeps them tender and moist.

Swap the carrot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, whiting, shrimp, butter, onion, flour, sugar):

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Carrotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, whiting, shrimp, butter, onion, flour, sugar. 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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