Skip to main content
Main

Scolloped Artichokes

A baked casserole of mashed artichokes mixed with thick white sauce, seasoned with salt and pepper, topped with breadcrumbs and oiled butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓

Scolloped Artichokes

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Boil the artichokes until soft, then mash until smooth.

  2. Season the mashed artichokes with salt and pepper, and mix in the thick white sauce.

Assemble and bake

  1. Butter a small fireproof dish and scatter seasoned breadcrumbs over the bottom.

  2. Fill the dish with the mashed artichokes and cover with more breadcrumbs.

  3. Pour oiled butter over the top and bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until evenly browned.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Artichoke + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,170 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  3. Sauce + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Artichoke + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together893 recipes

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

  5. Artichoke + saucetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together462 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Sauce and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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

Artichokes
Form the main body of the casserole, providing bulk and their characteristic flavor.
Thick white sauce
Binds the mashed artichokes into a moist, spoonable mixture and adds creaminess.
Fine dry breadcrumbs
Form a crisp, golden crust on the top and bottom of the dish.
Butter
Adds richness and promotes browning of the breadcrumb topping.

The step that matters

Bake until evenly browned. The mashed mixture is moist, so the oven must be hot enough to brown the breadcrumbs and butter on top. Checking for even colour shows when the surface has set and crisped.

“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.

You might also like

Artichoke SoupArtichoke Soup55 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipes