Why it works: Endive and nutmeg share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 47 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓
Pueee Op Endives
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Prepare and cook the endives as described in recipe No. 699.
Chop the cooked endives finely.
Make the sauce
In a saucepan, combine the chopped endives with butter, salt, pepper, and nutmeg.
Stir over medium heat and add the reduced Allemande or cream sauce.
Rub the mixture through a fine sieve and return it to the saucepan to warm thoroughly.
Add the half-glaze and a piece of butter, then serve.
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.
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Endive + nutmegtop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together47 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
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Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together13,015 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
-
Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
-
Endive + peppertop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together308 recipes
Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
-
Nutmeg + creamtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,920 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Endives
- Form the bulk of the dish, providing the main flavour and body once chopped and sieved.
- Butter
- Adds richness and a smooth, glossy mouthfeel to the warmed mixture.
- Allemande or cream sauce
- Adds creaminess and moisture, giving the purée a silky, spoonable texture.
- Half-glaze
- Adds concentrated savoury depth and a richer, browner colour to the finished sauce.
The step that matters
Rub the mixture through a fine sieve. Pressing the chopped endives through a fine sieve breaks down the fibres so the purée becomes smooth. Skipping or rushing this leaves a coarse, stringy texture.
Swap the endive
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, pepper, nutmeg, cream):
- Spinachfits better
- Potatofits better
- Capsicumfits better
- Endivethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, pepper, nutmeg, cream. 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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