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Kidney Beans, White, Fricasseed

A creamy white kidney bean fricassee with herbs, butter, sherry, and egg yolks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Kidney Beans, White, Fricasseed

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beans

  1. If using dry beans, soak them in water for 10‑12 hours, then boil until tender and remove the skins.

  2. If using fresh beans, scald them in boiling water for 1 minute, then peel off the skins.

Make the sauce

  1. Place the beans in a saucepan and cover with veal stock.

  2. Add salt, pepper, grated nutmeg, parsley, thyme, and butter.

  3. Simmer gently for 15 minutes, then remove the herbs.

  4. Add sherry to the sauce and let it boil.

  5. Remove from heat, cool for 1 minute, then stir in egg yolks, cream, and lemon juice.

Serve

  1. Serve hot, garnished with pickled French beans.

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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Nutmeg + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Nutmeg + thymetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,907 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Pepper + thymetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

What each ingredient does

White kidney beans
Form the main body of the dish and absorb the surrounding sauce flavours.
Egg yolks
Thicken the sauce and give it a smooth, rich texture when gently heated.
Thick cream
Adds richness and body, softening the sauce's texture.
Sherry
Adds aromatic depth and a slight sweetness to the sauce.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and with flour helps thicken the sauce.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich sauce.

The step that matters

Adding the egg yolks and cream off the heat. Egg yolks set when heated, so if the sauce is too hot they can curdle and turn grainy. Cooling briefly and stirring gently keeps the sauce smooth and thickened.

Swap the kidney beans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, nutmeg, parsley, thyme, butter, flour, sherry):

  1. Chestnutfits better
  2. Almondfits better
  3. Chickpeafits better
  4. Kidney beansthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, nutmeg, parsley, thyme, butter, flour, sherry. 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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