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Fish

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 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 ↓

Fish

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Clean the fish under running water.

  2. Rub the fish with coarse sea salt and scrape with a knife.

  3. Scale the fish using the back of a knife.

  4. Skin the fish from head to tail, or tail to head for flat fish, using a knife for plaice.

  5. Keep a fin on the fish while boiling to check doneness, or use a skewer near the bone.

  6. Add a spoonful of vinegar to the boiling water for firm and tender fish.

  7. Add a pinch of bicarbonate of soda when boiling salmon for a beautiful red color.

  8. Soak salt fish in sour milk to freshen it quickly.

  9. Scour the cooking pan with soda water after use, then rub with butter to remove fish odor.

  10. Add a little vinegar to the pan after frying fish or onions to eliminate the smell.

  11. Season bread crumbs with salt, pepper, and chopped parsley before using for fish fillets.

  12. Lift fried items out of boiling fat three or four times during cooking to make them light and puffed up.

  13. Salt the boiling water with one tablespoon of salt per gallon.

  14. Add lemon juice to white fish for improved flavor.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

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

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Parsleythe original
  2. Tarragonfits about as well
  3. Thymefits about as well
  4. Marjoramfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, vinegar, milk, butter, pepper, lemon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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