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Fish Pudding

A baked pudding made from minced fish, mashed potatoes, butter, milk or egg, and seasonings, topped with butter and garnished with parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Fish Pudding

Ingredients

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

  1. Remove all bones and skin from the fish and mince it.

  2. Rub the potatoes through a wire sieve or mash them very finely.

  3. Combine the minced fish and potatoes, adding pepper, salt, and cayenne to taste.

  4. Melt 2 tablespoons of butter and mix it into the fish and potato mixture.

  5. Add enough milk or beaten egg to moisten the mixture without making it too damp.

Bake and serve

  1. Grease a pudding mold and sprinkle some brown bread crumbs inside.

  2. Press the mixture into the mold and top with a few bits of butter.

  3. Bake at 400°F (200°C) for 20 minutes.

  4. Turn out the pudding and garnish with parsley.

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

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

  2. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

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

  3. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  5. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 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

Cold fish
Forms the main body of the pudding, giving it its flavor and bulk.
Cold boiled potatoes
Adds starch and softness, binding the fish and keeping the pudding tender.
Butter or dripping
Adds fat for richness and moisture, and helps the top brown in the oven.
Milk or egg
Adds moisture and, when egg is used, helps bind the mixture as it sets.

The step that matters

Adding milk or egg. Too much liquid makes the mixture wet and loose, so it will not hold its shape when turned out. Add just enough to moisten it, since the potatoes and fish already hold much of the structure.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, potato, pepper, butter, milk, bread):

  1. Parsleythe original
  2. Thymefits about as well
  3. Nutmegfits about as well
  4. Marjoramfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, potato, pepper, butter, milk, bread. 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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