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Herb Gumbo

A veal and ham gumbo flavored with onions, peppers, and a mix of leafy herbs, served over rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Spinach and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 427 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Herb Gumbo

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the herbs

  1. Thoroughly boil the herbs together.

  2. Chop the boiled herbs finely.

Brown the meat

  1. In a pot, heat the lard until hot.

  2. Add the brisket of veal and smother slowly for 30 minutes.

  3. Sprinkle in a pinch of flour.

  4. Let the veal fry until brown.

  5. Add onions to taste.

  6. Add the raw ham pieces.

  7. Stir in the chopped herbs for a short while.

Stew and serve

  1. Pour in the boiling water.

  2. Let it stew for about 30 minutes.

  3. Add red or green pepper to taste.

  4. Serve with rice on the side.

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. Spinach + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together427 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  2. Pepper + spinachtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  3. Onion + lettucetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,562 recipes

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

  4. Onion + spinachtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,336 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Rice + lettucetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together520 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

What each ingredient does

Brisket of veal
Forms the main body of the stew, becoming tender during slow cooking.
Raw ham
Adds savoury, salty flavour to the broth as it cooks.
Herbs
Provide the green leafy body and earthy flavour of the gumbo.
Flour
Lightly thickens the cooking liquid and helps the meat brown.
Onions
Add sweetness and aroma as they soften and brown in the lard.

The step that matters

Browning the veal. Letting the veal fry until brown before adding liquid builds deep, roasted flavour through the Maillard reaction. Pale meat gives a flatter, less rich stew.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, flour, ham, pepper, rice, spinach, lettuce):

  1. Okrafits better
  2. Turnipfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, flour, ham, pepper, rice, spinach, lettuce. 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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