Why it works: Butter and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 118,967 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓
Yellow String Beans
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Cut the beans into small pieces.
Cover with cold water and bring to a boil.
Cook
After boiling for about 30 minutes, pour off the water.
Add fresh hot water and seasoning to taste.
Add butter and boil slowly for another 1.5 hours.
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 + eggtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
-
Beans + buttertop 19% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,799 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
-
Beans + eggtop 32% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,030 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Yellow string beans
- Provide the main vegetable that softens and becomes tender during long simmering.
- Butter
- Adds richness and fat, giving the cooked beans a smoother, rounder mouthfeel.
Swap the beans
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, egg):
- Pecansfits better
- Almondfits better
- Filbertfits better
- Beansthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, egg. 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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