Skip to main content
Main

Broiled Turbot

A small turbot marinated in oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper, then broiled and served with caper sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Broiled Turbot

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Marinate the turbot in oil, vinegar, pepper, and salt for 1 hour.

  2. Preheat the grill.

  3. Slit the skin on the black side of the turbot.

Cook and serve

  1. Broil the turbot until it is nicely colored.

  2. Dish it up and serve with caper sauce.

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. Turbot + saucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together248 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

  3. Turbot + vinegartop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together132 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Vinegar + saucetop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,844 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Pepper + saucetop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,303 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Pepper and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,303 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Turbot
Forms the main body of the dish, cooked by direct heat from the grill.
Oil
Coats the fish during marinating, helping keep its surface moist under high heat.
Vinegar
Adds acidity to the marinade, which brightens the flavor of the mild fish.

The step that matters

Broil the turbot until it is nicely colored. Under intense grill heat the surface can scorch before the thick flesh cooks through. Watching color and checking the flesh near the bone helps the fish cook evenly and stay moist.

“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

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipesYorkshire PuddingYorkshire Pudding264 recipes