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Fish in Milk

A simple baked fish dish cooked in milk with butter, flour, and optional parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 in Milk

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. Clean the plaice and remove the eyes, fins, and tail.

  2. Place the fish in a baking tin, white side up.

Bake

  1. Pour ½ cup of milk around the fish.

  2. Dot the top with butter or dripping.

  3. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for about 45 minutes, basting occasionally.

  4. Thicken the milk with 1 tablespoon of flour.

  5. Season the sauce with salt and pepper to taste.

  6. Pour the thickened sauce over the fish.

  7. Add chopped parsley to the sauce if desired.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Plaice
The main fish, which cooks gently in the milk and stays moist under the sauce.
Milk
Forms the sauce that bastes the fish and carries its flavour.
Butter or dripping
Adds fat and richness and helps the top brown lightly in the oven.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth sauce that clings to the fish.

The step that matters

Thickening the milk with flour. Flour must be mixed in so it dissolves evenly; stirred in lumps, it stays grainy. Starch swells when heated and gives the sauce body.

Swap the parsley

The recipe marks parsley as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, butter, flour, pepper):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Cardamomfits about as well
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, butter, flour, pepper. 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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