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Fillets of Sole with Shrimps

Sole fillets are spread with a chopped shrimp mixture, rolled and baked, then served with a sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Shrimp and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,931 recipes. Both carry 2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, green. The science ↓

Fillets of Sole with Shrimps

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the fish

  1. Fillet the sole and chop the shrimps.

  2. Mix the shrimps with half the melted butter and a little seasoning.

  3. Spread the mixture on each fillet and tie with strings.

Bake and make the sauce

  1. Place the fillets on a greased baking tin and squeeze lemon juice over them.

  2. Cover with buttered paper and bake for 20 minutes at 350°F (175°C).

  3. In a saucepan, make a sauce with the remaining butter, flour, and fish stock.

Serve

  1. Serve the fish and pour the sauce over it.

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. Shrimp + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,931 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  2. Butter + fishtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,488 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. Shrimp + fishtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together252 recipes

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

  5. Fish + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,889 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, 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

Sole
Forms the main body of the dish, cooking gently into tender, flaky fillets.
Shrimps
Add savoury flavour and a firmer, slightly chewy texture to the stuffing.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, carrying flavour through the fish and sauce.
Flour
Thickens the butter and stock into a smooth, cohesive sauce.
Fish stock or milk
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, giving body and savoury flavour.

The step that matters

Covering with buttered paper while baking. The cover traps steam so the delicate fish cooks gently and stays moist rather than drying out in the oven heat.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Coconutfits better
  2. Lemonthe original
  3. Raisinfits less well
  4. Avocadofits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against shrimp, butter, flour, fish. 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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