Name: Red Herrings, a LA Dauphin
Ingredients: 2 red herrings; ½ cup warm milk; ½ cup water; 2 tablespoons fresh butter; 2 egg yolks; 2 tablespoons minced savory herbs; 1 cup fine bread crumbs; cayenne pepper to taste; 2 slices of bread for toasting

Why it works: Butter and bread 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 ↓

Red Herrings, a LA Dauphin

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the herrings

Remove the heads and backbones from the herrings.
Soak the herrings in warm milk and water for 2–3 hours if very dry.
Drain and wipe the herrings.

Coat and broil

Melt the butter and mix it with the beaten egg yolks and minced herbs.
Dip the fish into the mixture and coat them thickly with bread crumbs.
Broil the herrings over moderate heat until they are a clear brown.

Serve

Serve on hot buttered toast, sprinkled with cayenne.

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.

Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together11,466 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together22,662 recipes

Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,964 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Red herrings: Provide the main fish, which is cooked whole after its heads and backbones are removed.
Egg yolks: Bind the melted butter and herbs so they cling to the fish coating.
Fine bread crumbs: Form a thick crust that browns under the broiler.
Butter: Adds richness and fat that carries the herbs and helps the coating brown.

The step that matters

Broil until a clear brown. Broiling over moderate heat browns the crumb coating through Maillard reactions, which build flavour and colour. Stopping too early leaves the coating pale and soft, while overcooking dries the fish and can scorch the crumbs.

“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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Red Herrings, a LA Dauphin