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Baked Cod or Whiting

A baked fish dish with cheese, herbs, onion, breadcrumbs, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Baked Cod or Whiting

Oven, in the book's wordsA cool oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a cool oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. Grease a flat baking dish.

  3. Brown a handful of bread crumbs in the oven.

  4. Chop the parsley, herbs, and onion.

  5. Cut the fish into 1‑inch thick slices.

Assemble and bake

  1. Sprinkle some parsley, herbs, and onion in the dish.

  2. Layer the fish on top, then cover with remaining parsley, onion, grated cheese, pepper, salt, and breadcrumbs.

  3. Dot with drippings and pour a little vinegar and water or broth into the dish.

  4. Bake for 15 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve hot or cold.

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

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

  2. Cheese + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,130 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Fish + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Fish
Forms the main body of the dish, cooking through into flaky, tender portions.
Dry cheese
Melts and browns on top, adding savoury richness and a golden crust.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, browned topping that helps keep the fish moist underneath.
Drippings
Add fat that carries flavour and helps the top brown.
Vinegar
Adds a small amount of acidity that brightens the savoury flavours.

The step that matters

Bake for 15 minutes. Fish cooks quickly and turns dry and rubbery if overbaked, so checking it as the flesh turns opaque and flakes matters, especially at a low oven temperature.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, cheese, parsley, bread, pepper, vinegar):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Tomatofits better
  3. Mustardfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, cheese, parsley, bread, pepper, vinegar. 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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