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Frogs Stewed

A stew of frog legs cooked in butter, flour, herbs, water, cream, and egg yolks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and summer savory match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 241 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Frogs Stewed

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the frog legs

  1. Parboil the frog legs for about 3 minutes, then drain them.

  2. In a stewpan, melt the butter over medium heat.

  3. Add the frog legs and fry for about 2 minutes, stirring to prevent burning.

Make the stew

  1. Sprinkle the flour over the frog legs and stir to combine.

  2. Add the parsley, summer savory, bay leaf, onion, salt, pepper, hot water, and cream.

  3. Boil gently until the frog legs are cooked through.

Finish and serve

  1. Remove the legs, strain the gravy, and mix in the beaten egg yolks.

  2. Place the frog legs in a serving dish, pour the gravy over them, and serve.

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. Parsley + summer savorytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together241 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Flour + summer savorytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together263 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Summer savory + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together671 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Summer savory + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together299 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Frog legs
Provide the main meat, which becomes tender as it simmers in the gravy.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, and helps the legs brown lightly when fried.
Flour
Thickens the gravy as it cooks with the liquid.
Cream
Adds richness and body, giving the gravy a smooth, creamy texture.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the gravy so it becomes smooth and velvety when mixed in.

The step that matters

Mix in the egg yolks. Egg yolks thicken when heated, but if the gravy is too hot when they go in, they can scramble and turn grainy. Remove the gravy from the heat before stirring them in for a smooth result.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, parsley, summer savory, pepper, cream, egg):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Okrafits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, parsley, summer savory, pepper, cream, egg. 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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