Why it works: Wheat and bread match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 209 recipes. Both carry 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline, which smells popcorn, roasted. The science ↓
Codfish, in Cream
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the fish
Cut the salt codfish into ¼ inch dice.
Pour boiling water over the fish and let it stand for 5 minutes.
Make and serve
Drain the fish and add it to the boiling cream.
Serve the mixture on toast and sprinkle with cayenne pepper if desired.
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.
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Wheat + breadtop 10% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together209 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
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Pepper + wheattop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together984 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together20,964 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Cream + peppertop 23% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together21,449 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
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Cream + wheattop 24% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together681 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Cream and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 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
- Salt codfish
- Supplies the main savory flavor and the substance of the dish.
- Thin cream
- Adds richness and a silky, moist texture to the fish.
The step that matters
Pour boiling water over the fish and let it stand. Salt codfish is cured heavily in salt. Soaking it in hot water draws out surplus salt and softens the flesh, so the finished dish is not overly salty or tough.
“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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