Why it works: Fish and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,924 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓
Fish Stock
Ingredients
Directions
Place fish bones and trimmings in a stew pan.
Add enough water to cover the fish.
Add the onion and bay leaf.
Boil for 15 minutes.
Strain the stock and use as needed.
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.
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Fish + oniontop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1,924 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Fish bones and trimmings
- Provide the main flavour and body of the stock as they simmer.
- Onion
- Adds savoury, slightly sweet aroma to the stock as it cooks.
- Bay leaf
- Adds a subtle herbal aroma to the broth.
The step that matters
Boil for 15 minutes. Boiling hard can cloud fish stock and draw out bitter flavours from the bones. Keeping the liquid at a gentle simmer helps the stock stay clear and clean-tasting.
“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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