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Curried Fish

A fish dish simmered in a curry sauce with apples, onions, butter, and fish stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 68,474 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Curried Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. In a skillet, melt the butter over medium heat and fry the diced apple and chopped onion until browned.

  2. Stir in the curry powder and flour, then gradually add the fish stock while stirring.

  3. Simmer the mixture slowly for 30 minutes.

  4. Add the vinegar or lemon juice, sugar, salt and pepper, then strain the sauce back into the saucepan.

Finish and serve

  1. Cut the cooked fish into pieces and add to the sauce, heating until hot.

  2. Serve with a border of rice.

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. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Fish + buttertop 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. Onion + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

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

Butter
Fat that softens and browns the apple and onion, building flavour in the base.
Flour
Thickens the curry sauce as it cooks with the stock.
Curry powder
Provides the main spiced aroma and flavour of the sauce.
Apple
Adds sweetness and body to the sauce as it browns and breaks down.
Vinegar or lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens and balances the rich curry sauce.

The step that matters

Simmering the sauce for 30 minutes. A slow simmer lets the flour fully cook and thicken the stock, removing a raw starchy taste and allowing the curry powder to bloom. Rushing this leaves a thin, floury sauce.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, butter, onion, flour, sugar, vinegar, pepper):

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Plumfits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, butter, onion, flour, sugar, vinegar, 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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