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Boiled Fish

A whole fish is boiled with vinegar and salt, served with butter, eggs, parsley, lemon, and optional ketchup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Boiled Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Weigh the fish and bind it in thin muslin or coarse cheesecloth.

  2. Fill a large kettle with water and add coarse sea salt to taste.

Poach the fish

  1. Bring the water to a boil.

  2. Reduce the heat so the water is at a boiling point but not boiling when adding the fish.

  3. Add 3 tablespoons of vinegar to the water for a large fish.

  4. Keep the water boiling and cook the fish for 6 minutes per pound, plus an additional 6 minutes for large fish.

  5. Avoid piercing the fish to check for doneness; ensure the water remains at a steady boil.

  6. If the water boils too vigorously, move the kettle to a cooler part of the stove.

Serve

  1. Serve the fish with drawn butter, sliced hard-boiled eggs, parsley, and lemon slices.

  2. Optionally, add tomato ketchup.

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. Parsley + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,398 recipes

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

  3. Lemon + tomatotop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,592 recipes

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

  4. Fish + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,488 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Fish
The main protein, which firms and turns opaque as it cooks gently in the poaching water.
Vinegar
Adds mild acidity to the poaching water, sharpening the flavor of the mild fish.
Drawn butter
Adds richness and fat that complements the lean, delicate fish.

The step that matters

Keep the water at a steady, gentle boil. A vigorous boil can break up the delicate flesh and overcook the outside before the center is done, so the heat must stay steady and controlled throughout cooking.

Swap the tomato

The recipe marks tomato as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, vinegar, butter, egg, parsley, lemon, ketchup):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Horseradishfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, vinegar, butter, egg, parsley, lemon, ketchup. 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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