Skip to main content
Main

Baked Haddock or Mackerel

A baked fish stuffed with breadcrumbs, suet, herbs, and milk or water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Baked Haddock or Mackerel

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. Prepare the fish as for boiling and dry it.

  2. Mix the bread crumbs, suet, parsley, and herbs with the salt and pepper, then moisten the stuffing with about 2 tablespoons of milk or water.

Stuff and bake

  1. Stuff the mixture inside the fish and sew up the opening.

  2. Place the fish on a greased baking tray and add a few small pieces of dripping on top.

  3. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 30 to 45 minutes, basting occasionally.

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

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

  3. Thyme + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

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

  4. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Bread + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,588 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Haddock or mackerel
Forms the main body of the dish, cooking through in the oven while the stuffing bastes it.
Bread crumbs
Absorb the moisture and liquid, giving the stuffing a soft, cohesive body.
Suet or dripping
Adds fat that keeps the fish moist and helps the surface brown as it bakes.
Milk or water
Moistens the crumbs so the stuffing holds together and stays tender.

The step that matters

Basting occasionally during baking. Fish is lean and dries out quickly in dry heat. Spooning the melting fat and juices back over the surface keeps the flesh moist and adds flavour while it cooks through.

Swap the thyme

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (haddock, bread, parsley, pepper, milk):

  1. Marjoramfits about as well
  2. Thymethe original
  3. Nutmegfits about as well
  4. Celeryfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against haddock, bread, parsley, pepper, milk. 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.

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesWhite BreadWhite Bread80 recipesBread OmeletteBread Omelette60 recipesOatmeal BreadOatmeal Bread51 recipes