Why it works: Vinegar and fennel work together. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 505 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
To Souse Mackarel
Ingredients
Directions
Wash the mackerel thoroughly and gut them.
Boil the mackerel in salted water until cooked.
Remove the mackerel and place them in a clean pan.
Cover the mackerel with the cooking liquid and add a little vinegar.
Before serving, garnish with fennel.
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.
-
Vinegar + fenneltop 19% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together505 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
You might also like
Tomato Soup526 recipes
Brown Bread461 recipes
Mutton Broth292 recipes
Yorkshire Pudding264 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.