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Turbot

A boiled turbot served with a sauce of butter, anchovies, capers, herbs, and wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 19 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Turbot

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Rub alegar over the fish for firmness.

  2. Place the fish belly up in a fish plate and cover tightly with a cloth.

  3. Boil water with plenty of salt and vinegar, then add the fish once boiling.

  4. Skim the water to prevent skin discoloration.

  5. Once cooked, carefully remove the fish and drain it.

  6. Remove the cloth and transfer the fish to a serving dish.

Make the sauce

  1. In a separate saucepan, melt butter and add anchovies, capers, chives, pepper, salt, nutmeg, flour, vinegar, and a little water, shaking until combined.

Serve

  1. Pour some sauce over the fish and serve.

  2. Garnish with oyster patties or fried oysters, and serve with lobster or gravy sauce, crisped parsley, and pickles.

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. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Thyme + basiltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  3. Parsley + basiltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,351 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Parsley + chivetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Onion + chivetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,907 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

Turbot
Forms the main body of the dish, holding its shape when poached.
Butter
Melted into the sauce to give it richness and a smooth, rounded texture.
Anchovies
Dissolve into the sauce to add a savoury, salty depth.
Capers
Add a sharp, briny acidity that cuts through the rich butter.
White wine
Flavours the poaching liquid and adds gentle acidity to the fish.

The step that matters

Skim the poaching water. Skimming removes foam and impurities that can cling to the skin and discolour the fish, keeping it pale and clean-looking.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turbot, vinegar, thyme, parsley, chive, basil, white wine):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Cucumberfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against turbot, vinegar, thyme, parsley, chive, basil, white wine. 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.

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