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Italian Beans

A hearty bean stew with kidney beans, onions, ground beef, olives, and tomato sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Olive and tomato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,539 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Italian Beans

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Fry the onions and hamburger in a skillet.

  2. Add the kidney beans, olives, and tomato sauce.

  3. Let simmer for 30 minutes before serving.

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. Olive + tomatotop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,539 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Onion + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Onion + olivetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Kidney beans + tomatotop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together821 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Kidney beans + olivetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together609 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans,trans-2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Kidney beans
Add body and soft texture, making the stew hearty and filling.
Onion
Adds sweetness and aroma as it softens and browns in the skillet.
Hamburger
Provides meaty richness and fat that carries flavour through the stew.
Ripe olives
Contribute briny, savoury flavour and a little fat to the stew.
Tomato sauce
Supplies liquid and acidity that build the stew's base and sauce.

Swap the kidney beans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, olive, tomato, sauce):

  1. Beansfits better
  2. Chickpeafits better
  3. Sesamefits better
  4. Kidney beansthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, olive, tomato, sauce. 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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