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Baked Herrings

Baked herrings are herrings coated with breadcrumb and herb mixture, baked until cooked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

Baked Herrings

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Split the herrings in half and remove the backbone.

  2. Mix the breadcrumbs, suet, herbs, salt, and pepper together, and bind with an egg or a little milk.

Bake and serve

  1. Spread some of this mixture on each half of the herrings, roll them up, and place on a buttered baking tin.

  2. Cover with buttered paper and bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for about 10 to 15 minutes.

  3. Serve on a hot dish with slices of lemon and sprigs of fresh parsley.

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. Thyme + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

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

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Parsley + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

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

  5. Marjoram + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Herrings
Provide the main flesh that is rolled around the stuffing and cooked through.
Breadcrumbs
Absorb moisture and bulk out the stuffing so it holds together around the fish.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the stuffing moist and rich during baking.
Egg
Binds the breadcrumb mixture so it stays in place when the fish is rolled.

The step that matters

Rolling and covering the herrings before baking. Rolling the fish tightly around the stuffing keeps the filling in place, and covering with buttered paper traps steam so the fish cooks gently and stays moist instead of drying out.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (thyme, marjoram, pepper, egg):

  1. Winter savoryfits about as well
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Sagefits about as well
  4. Rosemaryfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against thyme, marjoram, pepper, egg. 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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