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Fish Toasts

A spread of minced fish mixed with butter, white sauce, and egg yolk served on hot fried toast, optionally topped with shrimp.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and shrimp are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,931 recipes. Both carry 2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, green. The science ↓

Fish Toasts

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Remove oil, skin, and bones from the fish.

  2. Chop the fish on a plate and knead it with a little fresh butter.

Make the fish topping

  1. Mix a small quantity of white sauce with the minced fish and add the egg yolk.

  2. Heat the mixture until thick enough to spread on hot fried toast.

Make the shrimp topping

  1. For shrimps or prawns, melt butter in a small saucepan over low heat.

  2. Add the shrimps and stir for a few minutes to absorb the butter.

Assemble and serve

  1. Spread pounded shell extract on hot fried toasts and top with shrimps.

  2. Dust with Nepal pepper and a little mace, then serve quickly.

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 + shrimptop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,931 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  4. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Pepper + macetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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

Fish
Forms the main savoury filling that is spread over the toast.
White sauce
Binds the minced fish into a spreadable, creamy mixture.
Egg yolk
Enriches the mixture and helps it set thick when heated.
Fresh butter
Adds richness and moisture to the minced fish.
Shrimps or prawns
Adds a sweet, delicate seafood topping to the toast.

The step that matters

Heat the mixture until thick enough to spread. Heating the white sauce and egg yolk mixture thickens it as the egg proteins set. If it is under-heated it stays runny and soaks into the toast; if overheated the egg can curdle and turn grainy.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, butter, sauce, egg, shrimp, pepper):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, butter, sauce, egg, shrimp, pepper. 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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