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Carp, Sauce for

A sauce made with butter, flour, gravy, cream, anchovies, soy sauce, salt, and lemon juice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Carp, Sauce for

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  2. Stir in the flour until smooth.

  3. Add the gravy, cream, and chopped anchovies.

  4. Bring to a boil, stirring well.

  5. Add the soy sauce and season with salt.

  6. Just before serving, squeeze in the lemon juice.

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. Cream + saucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

Flour
Thickens the butter and cream into a smooth, body-rich sauce.
Heavy cream
Adds richness and a smooth, silky texture to the sauce.
Butter
Carries flavor and adds richness as the base of the sauce.
Anchovies
Contribute a deep, savory umami flavor that blends into the sauce.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich sauce.

The step that matters

Bring to a boil, stirring well. Flour needs to be heated and kept moving so it thickens smoothly without lumps. Cream can scorch or separate if left unattended on the heat.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

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