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Creamed Onions

Creamed onions are onions cooked with butter, flour, beef stock, and heavy cream, seasoned with sea salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and beef are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Creamed Onions

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the onions

  1. Select medium small white onions.

  2. Cook in boiling salted water until nearly done; drain water.

Make the sauce

  1. In a saucepan, melt butter and whisk in flour until browned.

  2. Add beef stock and bring to a boil.

  3. Add cooked onions and season to taste.

  4. About 15 minutes before serving, stir in heavy cream.

Serve

  1. Serve very hot.

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. Onion + beeftop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + beeftop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,847 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

Flour and butter 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

Flour
Thickens the sauce with starch and, when browned with butter, adds a nutty flavor.
Butter
Carries the flour and adds richness and flavor to the sauce base.
Beef stock
Provides the liquid base and savory flavor of the sauce.
Heavy cream
Adds fat for a smooth, rich texture and a creamy finish.

The step that matters

Whisking the flour into the browning butter. Flour must be cooked in the fat until it is evenly mixed and lightly browned; stirring it in cleanly prevents lumps and removes raw starch taste. Scorching the butter gives a bitter flavor, so watch the color closely.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, beef, cream):

  1. Leekfits about as well
  2. Potatofits about as well
  3. Chivefits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, beef, cream. 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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