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Fish, with Herb Sauce

A baked flat fish served with a thick white herb sauce, topped with breadcrumbs and oiled butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and chervil match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 774 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Fish, with Herb Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Divide the fish into four fillets.

Assemble and bake

  1. Grease a flat baking tin and lay two fillets down.

  2. Spread ½ cup of thick white sauce mixed with parsley, onion, and chervil over the fillets.

  3. Place the other two fillets on top and cover with greased paper.

  4. Cook until the fish is almost done.

  5. Remove the paper, spread the remaining sauce on top, and sprinkle with salt, nutmeg, coralline pepper, and breadcrumbs.

  6. Drizzle with oiled butter and brown in the oven.

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 + cherviltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together774 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

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

  3. Parsley + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

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

  4. Chervil + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together103 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Flat fish
Forms the main body of the dish, cooking gently under the cover of paper.
Thick white sauce
Adds moisture and a creamy texture that keeps the fish from drying out.
Browned breadcrumbs
Form a crisp, golden crust on top through browning in the oven.
Oiled butter
Adds fat that helps the top brown and gives richness.

The step that matters

Cook until the fish is almost done. Fish cooks quickly and turns dry and firm if overcooked. Stopping while it is just nearly done lets residual heat finish it during the final browning.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, sauce, parsley, chervil, nutmeg, pepper, butter):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, sauce, parsley, chervil, nutmeg, pepper, butter. 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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