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Asparagus Peas

A creamy side dish of asparagus peas served over a toasted French roll.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Asparagus and peas match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 808 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Asparagus Peas

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the asparagus

  1. Cut the asparagus into pieces the size of peas, wash them, and place in a stewpan.

  2. Add ½ cup hot water and ¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt, then boil until three-quarters cooked.

  3. Strain the peas, reserving the cooking liquid.

Make the sauce

  1. Boil the reserved liquid until reduced, then add 3 ounces of fresh butter, ½ cup cream, and 1 teaspoon sifted sugar.

  2. Add flour and water as needed to achieve a proper thickness.

Serve

  1. Stir in the peas and serve over a toasted and buttered French roll.

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. Asparagus + peastop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together808 recipes

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

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  3. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Asparagus + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together936 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

Asparagus
Forms the main body of the dish and gives its vegetable flavor and texture.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving the sauce a smooth, rounded mouthfeel.
Cream
Adds richness and body, helping the reduced liquid turn smooth and velvety.
Flour
Thickens the liquid so the sauce holds its body around the peas.

The step that matters

Reducing the cooking liquid. The liquid must be boiled down enough to concentrate its flavor before butter and cream are added. Too little reduction leaves the sauce thin and watery, while boiling too hard after adding dairy can cause it to separate.

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (asparagus, butter, cream, sugar, flour):

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Hazelnutfits better
  3. Chestnutfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against asparagus, butter, cream, sugar, flour. 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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