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Sauce

Melted Butter

A sauce made by melting butter with flour, milk, and water until it reaches a creamy consistency.

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

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Melted Butter

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Use a pint stewpan reserved for this purpose.

  2. Cut the butter into small pieces for easier melting.

Cook the sauce

  1. Add the butter, flour, and milk to the stewpan and mix well.

  2. Gradually add the water while holding the pan over the fire.

  3. Shake the pan continuously until the mixture just boils.

  4. The final consistency should be similar to good cream.

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

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

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Fat that carries flavour and gives the sauce a smooth, rich mouthfeel.
Flour
Starch that thickens the liquid as it heats with the butter and milk.
Milk
Adds milk proteins and sugars for body and a creamier texture.

The step that matters

Shaking the pan until it just boils. Flour must be evenly dispersed in the liquid and heated so its starch swells and thickens. Continuous shaking keeps the mixture moving, which helps prevent lumps and scorching at the base of the pan.

“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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