Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
To Ery Smelts
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Remove gills from the smelts without opening them.
Wash and dry the smelts thoroughly with a cloth.
Coat and fry
Dip the smelts into the beaten egg yolk.
Coat the smelts with bread crumbs mixed with flour.
Fry the smelts in hot oil until they are a clear golden brown.
Serve
Serve the smelts very crisp and dry with melted butter in a tureen.
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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Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together22,662 recipes
Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Fresh smelts
- The main fish, cooked whole so the thin body crisps quickly in hot oil.
- Egg yolk
- Acts as a binder so the crumb coating adheres to the fish during frying.
- Bread crumbs
- Form a crisp, golden outer crust when fried.
- Flour
- Dries the surface and helps the crumb coating stick and brown evenly.
- Melted butter
- Adds richness and flavour as a serving sauce over the crisp fish.
The step that matters
Drying the smelts before coating. Any surface moisture turns to steam in hot oil and pushes the coating off, so the fish must be thoroughly dry before dipping and coating.
“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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