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The Head of a Holibut Stewed

A stew of a fish head cooked with anchovies, herbs, spices, wine, and a forcemeat thickener.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Marjoram and rosemary match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and 178 recipes mention both. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Fill a stewpan nearly full with water.

  2. Add anchovies, marjoram, rosemary, cloves, white pepper, and ginger.

  3. Stew for 30 minutes, then strain the mixture.

Finish the stew

  1. Add the head of the fish and stew until tender.

  2. Thicken the gravy with flour rolled in butter.

  3. Add anchovies or essence and nutmeg.

  4. Before serving, stir in white wine and forcemeat balls.

  5. Season with salt to taste.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Marjoram + rosemarytop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together178 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Clove + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together5,171 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together8,368 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Marjoram + nutmegtop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together687 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Marjoram + clovetop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together962 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Fish head
Gives the stew its main body and rich fish flavour as it stews.
Flour
Thickens the gravy, giving it body when rolled in butter.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and helps the flour thicken the gravy smoothly.
White wine
Adds acidity and brightness to balance the rich, savoury gravy.
Forcemeat
Adds soft, tender dumplings that absorb the gravy and add texture.

The step that matters

Thicken the gravy with flour rolled in butter. Flour must be cooked in fat and stirred into hot liquid to thicken evenly. Adding it without this mixing can leave lumps and an uneven, floury gravy.

Flavor stand-ins for the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (marjoram, rosemary, clove, ginger, flour, butter, nutmeg):

  1. Cinnamonbetter flavor fit
  2. Allspicebetter flavor fit
  3. Sagebetter flavor fit
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against marjoram, rosemary, clove, ginger, flour, butter, nutmeg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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