Name: Turbot Au Gratin a LA Creme
Ingredients: 1 fillet of turbot; ½ pint of Cream Bechamel Sauce; browned bread crumbs

Why it works: Turbot and sauce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 248 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Turbot Au Gratin a LA Creme

Ingredients

1 fillet of turbot
½ pint of Cream Bechamel Sauce
browned bread crumbs

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

Boil the fillet of turbot as directed.

Assemble and bake

Cover the fillet with ½ pint of Cream Bechamel Sauce.
Sprinkle browned bread crumbs on top.
Place in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 5 minutes.

Serve

Serve immediately.

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.

Turbot + saucetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together248 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Cream + saucetop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,787 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Turbot + creamtop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together127 recipes

Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).
Sauce + breadtop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,934 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Turbot + breadtop 23% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together129 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

What each ingredient does

Fillet of turbot: Forms the main body of the gratin, cooked by boiling before baking.
Cream bechamel sauce: Coats the fish with a creamy layer that keeps it moist in the oven.
Browned bread crumbs: Adds a crisp, golden topping when heated.

“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.