Why it works: Onion and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 42,912 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓
Fried Onions
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Peel and slice the onions.
Boil and drain
Boil the onions in salted water for 20 minutes.
Drain the onions and place them in a skillet with butter.
Fry
Fry the onions for 1 hour, seasoning to taste.
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.
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Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together42,912 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Onions
- Provide the main bulk; long frying softens them and browns their natural sugars into a sweet, rich flavour.
- Butter
- Adds fat for frying, carrying flavour and helping the onions brown evenly in the skillet.
The step that matters
Frying the onions for 1 hour. Onions need low, steady heat and time to lose their moisture and caramelise; if the heat is too high they can scorch before turning sweet and golden.
“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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