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Turbot a LA Creme

A baked haddock dish with a creamy sauce, topped with cracker crumbs and cheese.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Turbot a LA Creme

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 the fish

  1. Boil the haddock and remove all bones.

  2. Shred the fish very fine.

Make the sauce

  1. In a pot, bring the milk, onion, and parsley to a boil.

  2. Mix the flour with cold milk and stir into the boiling mixture along with the egg yolks.

  3. Season with white pepper, thyme, butter, and salt.

Assemble and bake

  1. Butter a pan and layer sauce, fish, and finish with sauce on top.

  2. Sprinkle with cracker crumbs and cheese.

  3. Bake for 1 hour at 350°F (175°C).

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 + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Onion + thymetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,171 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

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

  4. Parsley + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + thymetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,721 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Haddock
Provides the flaky fish that forms the body of the dish.
Flour
Thickens the milk mixture into a smooth, sliceable sauce.
Egg yolks
Enrich the sauce and help it set firm during baking.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the sauce and the baking dish.
Milk
Forms the base of the cream sauce that keeps the fish moist.

The step that matters

Stirring the egg yolks into the boiling mixture. Adding yolks to very hot liquid can scramble them into lumps. Stir steadily and keep the heat controlled so the sauce thickens smoothly and sets evenly.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (haddock, milk, onion, parsley, flour, egg, thyme):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Dillfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against haddock, milk, onion, parsley, flour, egg, thyme. 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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