Skip to main content
Main

Halibut Steak a LA Flamande

A baked halibut steak topped with onion, egg yolk, parsley, lemon, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Parsley and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Halibut Steak a LA Flamande

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Wash and dry the halibut steak.

  2. Butter the bottom of a flat, fire-safe dish.

  3. Sprinkle grated onion, salt, and pepper over the bottom.

Assemble and bake

  1. Place the fish on top and brush it with the egg yolk.

  2. Sprinkle with more grated onion, salt, pepper, and chopped parsley.

  3. Pour lemon juice over the fish and dot with bits of butter.

  4. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 30 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve in the baking dish, garnished with parsley and lemon.

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 + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  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

Halibut steak
Forms the main body of the dish and cooks gently in its own juices.
Egg yolk
Adds richness and helps the topping bind and brown lightly in the oven.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, keeping the fish moist as it bakes.
Onion
Adds aroma and savory flavor as it softens and releases moisture into the dish.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the mild flavor of the fish.

The step that matters

Brush the fish with egg yolk before baking. The yolk coats the surface so it enriches the fish and browns gently in the oven, while the steak itself must be dried first so the coating adheres and the fish does not steam.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, pepper, egg, parsley, lemon):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Spinachfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, pepper, egg, parsley, lemon. 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.

You might also like

Lemon SauceLemon Sauce236 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipes