Name: Veal Stew, with Green Peas
Ingredients: 1 pound veal, cut into pieces; 2 cups freshly-shelled green peas; 1 lettuce, finely shredded; Salt and pepper to taste; 2 tablespoons flour (for thickening)

Why it works: Peas and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,293 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Veal Stew, with Green Peas

Ingredients

1 pound veal, cut into pieces
2 cups freshly-shelled green peas
1 lettuce, finely shredded
Salt and pepper to taste
2 tablespoons flour (for thickening)

Directions

Stew

Stew the veal in a pot until it is three‑quarters cooked.
Add the green peas and shredded lettuce to the pot.
Let the mixture stew for an additional 30 minutes.

Thicken and serve

Thicken the gravy with flour, stirring until smooth.
Serve the veal on a hot dish, pouring the gravy and peas over it.

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.

Peas + lettucetop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,293 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
Lettuce + peppertop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,037 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Lettuce + flourtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,236 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Peas + peppertop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,331 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together50,459 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal: Provides the main meat, which becomes tender as it slowly stews.
Green peas: Add sweetness and body to the stew as they soften during cooking.
Lettuce: Adds moisture and a soft, tender texture as it wilts into the stew.
Flour: Thickens the cooking liquid into a smooth gravy.

The step that matters

Thicken the gravy with flour, stirring until smooth. Flour added directly to hot liquid can clump. Stirring it in thoroughly, ideally after mixing it with some liquid first, lets the starch disperse evenly and thicken the gravy smoothly.

Swap the peas

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

Chestnutfits better
Lentilsfits better
Beansfits better
Peasthe original

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

Green Peas229 recipes

Veal Patties50 recipes

Green Peas Soup35 recipes

Creamy Lettuce Soup8 recipes

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Veal Stew, with Green Peas