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Gurnet, Baked

Baked gurnet stuffed with veal forcemeat, covered in bacon and butter, cooked in an oven.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Veal and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 23% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,381 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Gurnet, Baked

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the fish

  1. Empty and wash the fish, then cut off the fins and gills.

  2. Prepare the forcemeat and pat it inside the fish.

  3. Sew up the opening.

  4. Fasten the tail in the mouth of the fish.

Bake

  1. Place it in a baking dish.

  2. Baste well with hot fat or butter.

  3. Cover with the slices of bacon.

  4. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for 35 to 40 minutes.

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. Veal + buttertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,381 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Gurnet
Forms the main body of the dish, cooking through to flaky, moist flesh.
Veal forcemeat
Fills the cavity, adding moisture and richness as it cooks inside the fish.
Bacon
Covers the fish, releasing fat that bastes the surface and adds savoury flavour.
Butter or fat
Basts the fish, conducting heat to the skin and helping it brown and stay moist.

The step that matters

Baste well with hot fat or butter. Fish is lean and dries out quickly in an oven. Hot fat coats the surface, carrying heat into the flesh and helping the skin brown without drying the flesh.

“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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