Why it works: Onion and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,585 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓
Irish Stew
Ingredients
Directions
Heat the grease in a kettle over a lively fire until hot.
Add the meat and brown it for about 15 minutes.
Stir in the flour until the sauce is fairly brown.
Add enough bouillon to create a sauce for all the meat.
Incorporate the crushed onion and turnips, and season with salt.
Boil the mixture for 10 minutes.
Fill the cans with the stew.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Onion + turniptop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together7,585 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
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Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together17,092 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Flour + turniptop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together2,874 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Meat + beeftop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,533 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
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Beef + turniptop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,940 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Flour
- Thickens the grease and bouillon into a sauce and helps it brown.
- Meat
- Browns in the hot grease to add savory flavor to the sauce.
- Grease
- Carries heat evenly and gives the meat and flour a rich, fatty base.
- Turnips
- Add body and mild sweetness to the stew as they cook down.
- Onion
- Softens into the sauce, adding aroma and savory depth.
The step that matters
Stir in the flour until the sauce is fairly brown. Flour cooked in hot fat must brown enough to lose its raw taste and to thicken properly; stopping too early leaves a pasty, floury flavor, while going too far can taste bitter.
Swap the turnip
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, beef, flour, sauce, onion):
- Shallotfits better
- Chivefits about as well
- Potatofits about as well
- Turnipthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against meat, beef, flour, sauce, onion. 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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