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To Fry Salt Fish

A fried small split codfish served with melted butter and Cornubian mustard‑vinegar sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,067 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

To Fry Salt Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and cook

  1. Water the fish to extract the salt.

  2. Fry the entire fish in a pan until cooked through.

Serve

  1. Serve with plain melted butter.

  2. Mix mustard and vinegar to create Cornubian sauce and serve alongside.

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. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Fish + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,488 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Butter + mustardtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,003 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Fish + mustardtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together238 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Butter + vinegartop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,513 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

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

What each ingredient does

Codfish
Salt fish is the main protein; soaking in water draws out excess salt.
Plain melted butter
Adds richness and moisture, rounding out the salty flavour of the fish.
Mustard
Adds sharp, pungent heat that contrasts with the richness of the fish.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that cuts through the salt and fat, brightening the sauce.

The step that matters

Water the fish to extract the salt.. Salt fish is cured heavily with salt, and soaking draws out surplus salt through osmosis. Without enough soaking, the fish stays too salty to eat comfortably.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, butter, vinegar):

  1. Shallotfits about as well
  2. Cucumberfits about as well
  3. Potatofits about as well
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, butter, 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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