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Pried Catfish

Fried catfish coated in flour and breadcrumbs, served with cayenne.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Pried Catfish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Wash and clean the catfish, removing heads and tails.

  2. Remove the upper part of the backbone near the shoulders.

  3. Score the fish along the back with deep gashes.

  4. Dredge the fish with flour.

Fry and serve

  1. Heat plenty of lard in a pan until boiling.

  2. For a batter, dip the fish in beaten egg and coat with bread crumbs or Indian meal before frying.

  3. Fry the catfish in the hot lard until cooked through.

  4. Drain excess lard before serving.

  5. Sprinkle a little cayenne on each incision before serving.

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. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

  2. Beef + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  3. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  4. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Catfish
Provides the main body of the dish, cooked through by frying in hot fat.
Flour
Forms a dry coating that helps the surface brown and crisp when fried.
Lard
Fat for frying that conducts heat evenly and gives the coating a crisp, golden surface.
Egg
Binds the bread crumbs or meal to the fish so the coating adheres during frying.
Bread crumbs or indian meal
Forms an outer crust that browns and crisps in the hot fat.

The step that matters

Frying in hot lard. The lard must be hot enough to start frying immediately. If it is too cool, the coating absorbs excess fat and turns greasy instead of crisp, and the fish cooks unevenly.

“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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