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Fish Omelet

A savory omelet made with codfish, potatoes, flour, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Fish Omelet

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Cook the flour and butter together in a pan until smooth.

  2. Gradually add the hot milk and a little pepper, stirring continuously.

Prepare the filling

  1. Pour boiling water over the shredded codfish.

  2. Drain the codfish.

  3. Mix the codfish with the thickened milk.

  4. Add the chopped cold boiled potatoes to the mixture.

Cook and serve

  1. Melt the additional tablespoon of butter in a skillet over medium heat.

  2. Add the fish mixture.

  3. Cook slowly until a thick crust forms.

  4. Fold the omelet over.

  5. Serve on a hot platter.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + potatotop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

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

Flour and butter 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

Flour
Cooks with the butter to form a roux that thickens the milk into a sauce.
Butter
Carries flavour and richness, and with the flour forms the base of the thickened sauce.
Milk
Becomes the thickened sauce that binds the fish and potatoes together.
Codfish
Supplies the main savoury flavour and the bulk of the filling.
Potatoes
Add body and soft texture to the filling, helping it hold together.

The step that matters

Cook slowly until a thick crust forms. Low, steady heat browns the underside gently and sets the egg-free filling into a firm crust. High heat would scorch the bottom before the centre is heated through, and folding too early would break the crust.

Swap the potato

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, milk, 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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