Name: Melted Butter for Fish
Ingredients: ½ cup melted butter; 2 tablespoons essence of anchovy; 2 tablespoons soy sauce; 2 tablespoons mushroom ketchup; ¼ teaspoon Cayenne pepper; 2 tablespoons chili vinegar; 1 lemon or 2 tablespoons lemon juice

Why it works: Sauce and ketchup match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,099 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Melted Butter for Fish

Ingredients

½ cup melted butter
2 tablespoons essence of anchovy
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons mushroom ketchup
¼ teaspoon Cayenne pepper
2 tablespoons chili vinegar
1 lemon or 2 tablespoons lemon juice

Directions

Melt the butter until it is thick enough to coat the fish.
Dilute the melted butter with essence of anchovy, soy sauce, mushroom ketchup, Cayenne pepper, chili vinegar, and lemon juice, mixing well to combine all ingredients.
Serve the sauce warm over cooked fish.

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.

Sauce + ketchuptop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,099 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Anchovy + saucetop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,057 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Anchovy + ketchuptop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together479 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together27,047 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together12,525 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter: Melted butter forms the rich base that coats the fish and carries the other flavors.
Essence of anchovy: Adds a salty, savory depth that gives the sauce its fishy character.
Soy sauce: Contributes salty, savory umami to round out the anchovy flavor.
Mushroom ketchup: Adds concentrated savory, umami depth to the sauce.
Lemon juice: Brings acidity that brightens the rich butter and balances the saltiness.

“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.