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Turnips

A stew of sliced turnips and fresh pork, seasoned with salt and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Turnips

Why it works: Turnip and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,252 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Turnips

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash, peel, and cut turnips into thin slices across the grain.

  2. Place turnips in a kettle with a piece of fresh pork.

Cook and season

  1. Cook until the water has stewed down low, then mash the turnips.

  2. Season with salt and pepper.

  3. Return to the heat and stir frequently until the water is completely evaporated.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Turnip + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,252 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Turnip + porktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,358 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  3. Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,121 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Turnips
Form the bulk of the stew and break down into a soft, mashable texture as they cook.
Fresh pork
Adds savory meat flavor and fat that enriches the broth as it cooks down.

The step that matters

Return to the heat and stir frequently until the water is completely evaporated. Once most of the liquid is gone, the mash can scorch on the bottom of the kettle. Frequent stirring spreads heat evenly and prevents sticking and burning.

Swap the turnip

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Tomatofits better
  4. Turnipthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, pepper. 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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