Skip to main content
Main

Crabmeat Ravigote

A crabmeat dish with a creamy sauce made from egg yolks, butter, flour, milk, and seasonings, served with pastry leaves.

From the Recipes Wiki (Fandom) · 16 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Crabmeat Ravigote

Oven350 °F
Time5 to 8 minutes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pastry leaves

  1. Roll patty shell out to ⅛‑inch thickness on a lightly floured surface.

  2. Cut into 16 leaf shapes.

  3. Place on a lightly greased baking sheet and bake at 350 °F for 5 to 8 minutes or until lightly browned.

  4. Set pastry leaves aside.

Make the hollandaise

  1. Combine egg yolks and 1 cup butter with a wire whisk in the top of a double boiler; bring water to a boil (water in the bottom should not touch the top pan).

  2. Reduce heat to low; cook, stirring constantly, until butter melts.

  3. Remove pan from water and stir rapidly for 2 minutes.

  4. Stir in lemon juice, 1 teaspoonful at a time; add hot sauce and salt.

  5. Place over boiling water; cook, stirring constantly, for 2 to 3 minutes or until thickened and bubbly.

  6. Immediately remove from heat.

Make the cream sauce and finish

  1. Melt 2 tablespoons butter in a heavy saucepan; add flour and cook for 1 minute, stirring constantly.

  2. Gradually add milk; cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until thickened.

  3. Stir in ½ teaspoon salt and white pepper.

  4. Add cream sauce to mixture in double boiler.

  5. Gently fold in crabmeat, green onion, and chopped parsley.

  6. Spoon into individual serving dishes and garnish with pastry leaves, parsley sprigs, and pimento.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

855Calories
30 gProtein
27 gFat
124 gCarbs

Counts 10 of 11 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 10 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Green Onion1 medium (110g)44
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12
Chili1 tsp (2.7g)8
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Parsley1 tbsp chopped fresh (3.8g)1
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Pimentonot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

Recipe from the Recipes Wiki (Fandom).

Steps grouped into stages for easier reading; the method is the source's own.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Egg yolks
Emulsify with butter and lemon juice to form a thick, rich hollandaise sauce.
Butter
Adds richness and silky texture to the hollandaise and the cream sauce base.
All-purpose flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth cream sauce when cooked with melted butter.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the cream sauce, which thickens as the flour cooks.
Fresh lump crabmeat
Provides the main flavor and delicate, tender texture of the dish.

The step that matters

Keep the hollandaise over simmering water, not boiling. Egg yolks scramble if they get too hot. Gentle, indirect heat from a double boiler, with stirring, thickens them smoothly into an emulsified sauce.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, butter, lemon, sauce, flour, milk, onion):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, butter, lemon, sauce, flour, milk, 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.

You might also like

Lemon SauceLemon Sauce236 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipes