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Greens or Potherbs

A preserved green vegetable mix canned in salt and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Chard and dandelion share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and 11 recipes mention both. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the greens

  1. Sort the greens thoroughly, removing any foreign leaves or debris.

  2. Wash the greens well in several waters and drain.

  3. Blanch the greens for 15 minutes in live steam or 4 minutes in rapidly boiling water.

  4. Cut the blanched greens into convenient lengths on a cutting board.

  5. Reheat the greens in a kettle.

Pack and season

  1. Pack the hot greens into hot jars or cans, being careful not to pack too tightly.

  2. Add boiling water to cover the greens, ensuring all air bubbles are removed.

  3. Season to taste with coarse sea salt.

Process and store

  1. Process under 30 pounds steam pressure for 90 minutes, or 35 minutes at 15 pounds.

  2. Seal the jars immediately after removing them from the canner.

  3. Cool tin cans quickly by plunging them into cold water and store in a dark, dry, cool place.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Chard + dandeliontop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together11 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Chard + kaletop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together72 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Cabbage + turniptop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together897 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Kale + dandeliontop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together8 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Kale + turniptop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together38 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

Swiss chard
Provides the bulk of the leafy texture and body once blanched and packed.
Kale
Adds sturdy leaves that hold their structure through heat processing.
Collards
Contributes firm, fibrous leaves that stay tender-chewy after canning.
Dandelion
Adds a slightly bitter flavour that mellows somewhat during blanching and processing.
Chinese cabbage leaves
Adds tender, mild leaves that soften quickly and absorb the packing liquid.

The step that matters

Blanching before packing. Blanching briefly heats the greens to inactivate enzymes that would otherwise cause colour and flavour loss, and it softens leaves so they pack evenly. Skipping or shortening it can leave greens dull and off-flavoured in the jar.

Flavor stand-ins for the new zealand spinach

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chard, kale, cabbage, endive, turnip, dandelion, mustard):

  1. Lettucebetter flavor fit
  2. Beetrootbetter flavor fit
  3. Broccolibetter flavor fit
  4. New zealand spinachthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chard, kale, cabbage, endive, turnip, dandelion, mustard. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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