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Sauce a LA Provenqale

A tomato and herb sauce with onions, garlic, mushrooms, and spices, finished with flour, wine, and stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and 8,368 recipes mention both. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Contains: wheat (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. In a saucepan, heat the salad oil.

  2. Add the chopped onion or shallot, garlic, tomatoes, mushrooms, parsley, and sweet herbs.

  3. Season with pepper, salt, nutmeg, and cloves; warm the mixture.

  4. Stir in the flour and mix well.

  5. Gradually add the white wine and stock; let the sauce boil for 10-15 minutes.

Finish and serve

  1. Strain the sauce and serve.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together8,368 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together29,030 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  3. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together34,118 recipes

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

  4. Garlic + tomatotop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together14,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  5. Pepper + clovetop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together13,144 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide moisture, acidity and body that give the sauce its fresh, savory base.
Flour
Thickens the sauce as it cooks with the liquids, giving it body.
White wine
Adds acidity and aroma while its flavor concentrates during boiling.
Mushrooms
Add savory, earthy flavor and moisture to the sauce base.
Onion or shallot
Builds a sweet, aromatic base as it softens in the hot oil.

The step that matters

Gradually add the white wine and stock. Adding liquid slowly while stirring the flour mixture keeps the flour dispersed, so the sauce thickens smoothly without lumps.

Flavor stand-ins for the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, garlic, tomato, mushroom, parsley, pepper, clove):

  1. Thymebetter flavor fit
  2. Basilbetter flavor fit
  3. Marjorambetter flavor fit
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, garlic, tomato, mushroom, parsley, pepper, clove. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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