Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and 124,287 recipes mention both. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Tomato Sauce
Ingredients
Directions
Make the sauce
Heat the butter.
Remove from the fire and stir in the flour.
Add the water and stir well.
Add the tomato, onion juice, salt, and pepper.
Boil for 5 minutes.
Serve
Serve hot with boiled macaroni, or with boiled or baked meat, or with baked eggs or fish.
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. See the original page.
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.
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together50,459 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
-
Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairsAroma overlapmoderateMentioned together85,593 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Butter and flour share little aroma chemistry, yet 124,287 recipes mention both: they likely 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
- Butter
- Melts to form the fat base that carries flavor and gives the sauce richness.
- Flour
- Starch that thickens the liquid into a smooth sauce as it is stirred in and heated.
- Water
- Liquid that hydrates the flour and forms the body of the sauce.
The step that matters
Stirring the flour into the hot butter off the heat. Flour added to fat off the heat coats the starch granules so they disperse without clumping. Adding water then and stirring well keeps the sauce smooth as it thickens.
“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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