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Red Mullets

A fish stew made with red mullets, port wine, anchovies, and herbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,331 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Red Mullets

Ingredients

Directions

Poach the mullets

  1. Scald the mullets in salted water for a few minutes, then remove them.

  2. In the remaining water, boil the sweet herbs, onions, peppercorns, and allspice until reduced to less than 1 pint.

Make the stew

  1. Strain the mixture and add the port wine, lemon juice, chopped anchovies, and nutmeg.

  2. When the anchovies dissolve, add the mullets, shrimp or oysters, butter, and flour for thickening.

  3. Simmer for a few minutes until the fish is cooked through, then serve.

Alternative preparations

  1. For baking, clean the mullets without removing the entrails, wrap in buttered or oiled paper, and bake gently.

  2. For sauce, use the cooking liquid with chopped anchovy, sherry, and a piece of butter rolled in flour, served separately.

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. Allspice + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,331 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

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

  3. Allspice + lemontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,083 recipes

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

  4. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Shrimp + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,931 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Red mullets
Provide the firm white fish that is cooked through in the stew.
Anchovies
Dissolve into the liquid to add savoury depth and saltiness to the sauce.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, and is rolled in flour to thicken the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid when combined with butter.
Port wine
Adds sweetness, body and colour to the stewing liquid.

The step that matters

Simmering the mullets. Simmer gently only until the fish is cooked through. Vigorous boiling breaks delicate fish apart and makes the flour-thickened liquid cloudy and rough.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (allspice, port wine, lemon, nutmeg, shrimp, butter, flour):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against allspice, port wine, lemon, nutmeg, shrimp, butter, flour. 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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