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Stewed Eels

A stew of eels simmered with stock, herbs, onion, spices, and finished with butter, flour, cream, and lemon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Stewed Eels

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the eels

  1. Cut the eels into pieces about 2 inches long.

  2. In a saucepan, combine the eels, stock, herbs, onion, peppercorns, mace, and a little lemon juice.

  3. Bring to a boil, skim off any foam, and simmer for about 30 minutes until the eels are cooked.

Make the sauce

  1. In another saucepan, mix the butter and flour and cook gently without browning.

  2. Remove the eels and keep them warm.

  3. Add the stock from the first saucepan to the butter and flour mixture, stirring until boiling.

  4. Boil for about 4 minutes, then season with salt and cayenne.

  5. Stir in the cream, then place the eels in the center of a hot dish and pour the sauce over them, coating each piece thoroughly.

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 + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

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

  3. Thyme + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

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

  4. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eels
The main protein; cooking them gently in stock keeps the flesh tender and moist.
Butter and flour
Form a roux that thickens the stock into a smooth, cohesive sauce.
White stock
Provides the cooking liquid that flavours the eels and becomes the base of the sauce.
Cream
Adds richness and body to the sauce and softens its flavour.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour of the eels and sauce.

The step that matters

Cook the roux without browning. Flour cooked gently only loses its raw starchy taste and thickens well; if it browns, the sauce takes on a darker colour and a toasted flavour the dish was not meant to have.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, onion, parsley, thyme, pepper, lemon):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Sagefits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, onion, parsley, thyme, pepper, 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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