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Fish Cakes with Vegetables

For an authentic flavour try Ken Hom's fish cakes with vegetables, straight from the markets of Hong Kong

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Why it works: Fish and mushroom match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and 444 recipes mention both. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

The recipe

Serves 4

Ingredients

Contains: egg, peanut, soy, fish, shellfish (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Step-by-step directions aren't available for this recipe. See the full recipe at the source →

By bbcgoodfood. Recipe from Open Recipes.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Fish + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together444 recipes

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

  2. Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together29,030 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  3. Shiitake + garlictop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together292 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Peanut + garlictop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together877 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-ethyl-2,5-dimethylpyrazine (roasted, nutty).

  5. Mushroom + shiitaketop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together552 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

Flavor stand-ins for the onion

The recipe marks onion as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, egg, ginger, peanut, mushroom, shiitake, garlic):

  1. Spinachabout as good a flavor fit
  2. Potatoabout as good a flavor fit
  3. Shallotabout as good a flavor fit
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, egg, ginger, peanut, mushroom, shiitake, garlic. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).