a dish of this, cooked with a tomato sauce, olives, garlic, etc.
Origin: 1545–55; < Sp bacal(l)ao, prob. < Basque bakaiļao, perh., by metathesis, < Gascon, the presumed source of OF cabellau, cabillau (F cabillaud) fresh codfish, equiv. to Gascon cabilh, cabelh (dim. of cap head; see chief) + a suffix, alluding to the fish's prominent head; though ML (Flanders) cabellauwus, the earliest attestation of the form (cf. MD cab(b)eliau, D kabeljauw) suggests a non-Rom, N European origin
[bah-kuh-lou, bak-uh-; Sp. bah-kah-lah-aw] 
