Skip to main content
Main

Salt Cod with Egg Sauce

Salt cod served with a sauce of milk, cornflour, eggs, butter, parsley, and mashed potato.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Salt Cod with Egg Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Pick or chop the soaked and boiled salt cod finely.

Make the sauce

  1. Heat the milk in a saucepan.

  2. Thicken the milk with cornflour, then add the mashed potato.

  3. Stir in the butter, beaten eggs, and chopped parsley.

Combine and serve

  1. Add the fish and mix well until heated through.

  2. Pour into a deep dish and serve.

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 + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

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

  3. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  5. Milk + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

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

What each ingredient does

Salt cod
Provides the main flaky texture and savory flavor of the dish.
Eggs
Set when heated, giving the mixture body and enriching it.
Mashed potato
Adds bulk and a soft, smooth texture that holds the fish together.
Cornflour
Thickens the warm milk so it becomes a creamy base.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Thickening the milk with cornflour. Cornflour must be stirred into warm milk and cooked until it thickens, because starch only swells fully with heat. Adding it to cold liquid or leaving it uncooked leaves a grainy, thin base.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, flour, egg, butter, parsley, pepper):

  1. Shallotfits about as well
  2. Chivefits about as well
  3. Potatothe original
  4. Capsicumfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, flour, egg, butter, parsley, 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.

You might also like

Potato CroquettesPotato Croquettes255 recipesPotato RollsPotato Rolls78 recipesPotato ChipsPotato Chips53 recipesSweet Potato CroquettesSweet Potato Croquettes53 recipes