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Planked Shad

A shad fillet cooked on a hickory plank, basted with butter and seasoned with salt and pepper, served with parsley and lemon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Planked Shad

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat your oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Prepare the plank by planing it out in the middle to hold the juices.

  3. Place the shad on the plank, skin side down.

Cook

  1. Baste the fish with melted butter and season with salt and pepper.

  2. Cook in the oven for 30 minutes.

  3. Baste again with melted butter before serving.

Serve

  1. Garnish with parsley and lemon slices.

  2. Serve the fish on the hot plank on a large platter or tray.

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 + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Shad
Is the main fish, cooked gently on the plank until its flesh turns opaque and flakes.
Melted butter
Adds fat and moisture, helping the fish stay juicy and carry seasoning across its surface.
Hickory plank
Holds the fish above its juices and gives a subtle smoky aroma as it heats.

The step that matters

Plank preparation. Planing a shallow well in the middle of the plank holds the juices that release as the fish cooks. Without it, liquid runs off the edges and the fish can steam unevenly or dry out.

“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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