Skip to main content
Main

Collared Eel

Collared eel is a boiled eel rolled with herbs and spices, set in a vinegar and allspice broth, finished with isinglass and egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Collared Eel

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the eel

  1. Bone the eel without skinning it, cut off the head and tail, split it down the back, and remove the bone.

  2. Lay the eel flat, sprinkle with sage, parsley, pepper, cloves, and salt, and roll it up tightly.

Cook and set

  1. Tie the eel in a cloth and boil in a mixture of vinegar, water, and allspice for 45 minutes.

  2. Remove the eel and add isinglass, beaten egg whites, and a little salt to the cooking liquid. Boil for 5 minutes.

  3. Strain the liquid through a jelly bag until fine.

  4. Once the eel is cold, remove it from the cloth.

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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Sage + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together331 recipes

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

  3. Sage + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,445 recipes

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

  4. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Parsley + allspicetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,289 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Eel
Forms the main body of the dish, rolled and cooked whole so it holds a neat spiral shape.
Isinglass
Gelatin-like fish protein that sets the cooking liquid into a clear jelly around the eel.
Egg whites
Bind with impurities as they coagulate, which clarifies the cooking liquid for a clear jelly.

The step that matters

Straining the liquid through a jelly bag until fine. Any cloudiness left in the liquid will show in the set jelly. Clarifying with egg whites only works if the liquid is strained gently and thoroughly, so the coagulated solids stay behind and the jelly comes out clear.

Swap the sage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (parsley, pepper, clove, vinegar, allspice, egg):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Sagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against parsley, pepper, clove, vinegar, allspice, egg. 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.

You might also like

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipesYorkshire PuddingYorkshire Pudding264 recipes