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Sauce

Creole Sauce

A tomato-based sauce with celery, green pepper, onion, flour, and butter, seasoned with salt and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,377 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Creole Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the base

  1. Melt the butter in a hot skillet.

  2. Add the chopped onion and cook until brown.

  3. Stir in the flour and chopped green pepper.

Finish the sauce

  1. Add the tomato soup and cook until thick.

  2. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

  3. If using, soak the green pepper in boiling water for 10 minutes to soften before chopping.

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. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Celery + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  5. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 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

Tomato soup
Forms the liquid base and provides most of the sauce's body and flavor.
Butter
Provides fat that carries flavor and helps the onion brown.
Onion
Adds savory sweetness and aroma as it browns in the fat.
Flour
Thickens the sauce as its starch swells in the hot liquid.
Green pepper
Adds fresh, slightly bitter vegetable flavor and some texture.

The step that matters

Add the tomato soup and cook until thick. The sauce thickens as water evaporates and the flour's starch swells in the hot liquid. Stopping early leaves it thin, so cook until it coats a spoon.

Swap the celery

The recipe marks celery as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, pepper, flour, onion, butter):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Parsleyfits about as well
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, pepper, flour, onion, butter. 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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