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Fricassee of Mushrooms

A fricassee of peeled mushrooms simmered in stock, thickened with flour and egg yolks, and served on hot biscuits.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Fricassee of Mushrooms

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mushrooms

  1. Put firm peeled mushrooms into boiling water for a moment.

  2. Transfer the mushrooms to ice water.

  3. Drain and wipe the mushrooms dry.

Make the gravy

  1. In a saucepan, melt butter over medium heat and add the mushrooms.

  2. Sprinkle in flour, white pepper, salt, thyme, and parsley; stir to combine.

  3. Pour in stock and let simmer for 20 minutes.

  4. Strain the gravy, then mix in the beaten egg yolks and lemon juice.

Serve

  1. Break hot biscuits in half and place on a heated dish.

  2. Carefully lay the mushrooms on the biscuits.

  3. Pour the gravy over the mushrooms and serve immediately.

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. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Mushroom + thymetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  3. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  4. Flour + biscuittop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together889 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Parsley + biscuittop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together204 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Firm mushrooms
Provide the main body and bite of the dish.
Butter
Adds richness and carries flavor when melted with the mushrooms.
Flour
Thickens the stock into a smooth gravy as it simmers.
Stock
Forms the liquid base of the gravy, building savory flavor.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the gravy when stirred in at the end.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich gravy.

The step that matters

Mixing in the egg yolks. Egg yolks thicken when heated, so adding them to a very hot gravy can scramble them. Stirring them in off the heat, after straining, helps keep the gravy smooth.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mushroom, butter, flour, thyme, parsley, biscuit, egg):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, butter, flour, thyme, parsley, biscuit, egg. 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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