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Scalloped Cod, Halibut or Salmon

A baked dish of flaked fish layered with a milk and flour sauce, breadcrumbs, eggs, and herbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Scalloped Cod, Halibut or Salmon

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the fish

  1. Remove the skin and bones from the fish and flake it with a fork.

Make the sauce

  1. Heat the milk in a saucepan and mix the flour with a little butter to form a paste.

  2. Stir the flour mixture into the milk, adding pepper and parsley.

  3. Beat the eggs and pour the milk mixture over them.

Assemble and bake

  1. Layer the bottom of a baking dish with bread crumbs, then add a layer of sauce, followed by a layer of fish.

  2. Repeat the layers until all ingredients are used, finishing with a layer of crumbs on top.

  3. Cover the dish and bake at 400°F (200°C) until bubbling, then uncover and brown the top.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Fish + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  3. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Flour + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Fish + milktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,432 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

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

What each ingredient does

Fish
Forms the main body of the dish, providing protein and substance in each layer.
Eggs
Beaten into the milk mixture to help the sauce set and bind the layers when baked.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, giving the dish its creamy moisture.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp top layer that browns in the oven and adds texture.
Prepared flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth sauce that holds the layers together.

The step that matters

Beating the eggs before adding the milk mixture. Eggs set when heated, so the hot milk mixture must be poured over them gradually and stirred in; if the eggs are not well beaten, they can clump and the dish may curdle or set unevenly.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, milk, bread, flour, pepper, egg):

  1. Nutmegfits about as well
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Capersfits about as well
  4. Cinnamonfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, milk, bread, flour, 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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