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Puree of Turnips

A smooth puree of cooked turnips mixed with butter, salt, sugar, béchamel sauce, and cream, finished with butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Puree of Turnips

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the turnips

  1. Wash and cut the turnips into small pieces.

  2. Cook the turnips in a pot until tender, then drain on a clean napkin.

Make the purée

  1. In a stewpan, combine the turnips with butter, salt, and sugar.

  2. Stew slowly, turning occasionally, until they are nearly cooked without changing color.

  3. Add the Bechamel sauce and stir while cooking until thickened.

  4. Stir in the cream and reduce the puree further.

  5. Pass the mixture through a fine sieve.

Reheat and serve

  1. Reheat in a small stewpan, adding a tablespoon of butter before serving.

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

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

  2. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  3. Sauce + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Sugar + saucetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,147 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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

Turnips
Form the bulk of the purée, giving its main flavor and body once cooked and sieved.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel while gently cooking the turnips.
Bechamel sauce
Thickens the purée and adds a smooth, binding body.
Rich cream
Adds fat and richness, producing a smoother, more velvety texture.

The step that matters

Stew slowly without browning. Low, slow heat with occasional turning softens the turnips evenly and keeps their color pale. Browning would add bitter, caramelized notes that clash with a delicate white purée.

Swap the turnip

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

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Horseradishfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Turnipthe original

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