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Greens on Toast

A dish of sautéed greens served on fried bread croutons with a sauce of butter, flour, milk, broth, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,081 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Greens on Toast

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the toast

  1. Cut croutons of bread into the shape of cutlets.

  2. Fry the cutlets in butter.

Prepare the greens

  1. Parboil the cabbages or greens.

  2. Arrange the parboiled greens in neat pieces to fit each piece of bread.

  3. Stew the greens in Spanish sauce or brown sauce.

  4. Place each piece of green on its corresponding crouton.

  5. Pour the sauce on the dish.

  6. Arrange the greens in a circle over it.

Make the turnip top sauce

  1. Boil the turnip tops in plenty of water with salt and baking soda.

  2. Drain the boiled turnip tops.

  3. Pass the drained turnip tops through a fine sieve.

  4. Melt butter.

  5. Add flour and the turnip top pulp to the melted butter.

  6. Stir the mixture on the fire for a few minutes.

  7. Add milk or cream.

  8. Add broth or stock.

  9. Season with pepper and grated nutmeg to taste.

  10. Wait until the mixture reaches a nice consistency.

Serve

  1. Serve it on a dish like spinach, with fried croutons around it.

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. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

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

  2. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Bread
Fried croutons provide a crisp base that holds the greens.
Butter
Fat that browns the bread and enriches the sauce.
Cabbages or greens
Main vegetable, providing bulk, texture and a fresh green flavour.
Spanish sauce or brown sauce
Stewing liquid that moistens the greens and adds savoury depth.
Flour
Thickens the melted butter into a roux that gives the sauce body.
Milk or cream
Adds richness and smoothness, softening the sauce's texture.

The step that matters

Stir the flour into the melted butter before adding liquid. Cooking flour in fat for a few minutes forms a roux. Stirring it on the fire avoids raw flour taste and lumps, and lets the mixture thicken evenly when liquid is added.

Swap the cabbage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, butter, sauce, flour, milk, pepper, nutmeg):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, butter, sauce, flour, milk, pepper, nutmeg. 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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