Why it works: Onion and lime are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,263 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓
Red Herring Burta
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the herring
Remove the gills from the herring and warm it on a griddle or frying pan.
Carefully remove the skin and bones from the herring.
Mix and serve
Bruise the herring and mix it thoroughly with the sliced onions, chilies, and lime juice.
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.
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Onion + limetop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,263 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Red herring
- Provides the main flesh and rich, oily flavor of the dish.
- Lime juice
- Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and sharpens the fish.
- Chilies
- Add heat and a sharp, fresh pungency.
- Onions
- Add a sharp, aromatic bite and savory depth to the mixture.
The step that matters
Carefully remove the skin and bones from the herring. Small bones are easy to miss once the fish is warm, and any bones left in will be mixed through the whole dish.
“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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