Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Brown Butter
Ingredients
Directions
Place a lump of butter in a frying pan over medium heat.
Swirl the butter until it turns brown.
Sprinkle in some brown flour.
Stir with a spoon until the mixture boils and is smooth.
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.
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 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
- Melts and browns to give the dish a nutty, toasted aroma and flavour.
- Brown flour
- Thickens the browned butter into a smooth mixture as it heats and cooks.
The step that matters
Swirl the butter until it turns brown. Butter browns quickly once its water has cooked off, so it can go from nutty to burnt in seconds. Keep it moving over medium heat and watch closely for the colour to change.
“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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