Why it works: Turnip and onion match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,585 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓
Puree of Turnips
Ingredients
Directions
Pare, slice, and cook turnips in boiling salted water until tender.
Rub the cooked turnips through a colander into a saucepan.
Stir in the roux, pepper, and salt.
Dissolve a bit of baking soda in the hot cream and add it to the mixture.
Remove from heat after it has boiled once and beat in the frothed egg.
Do not boil again; set the saucepan in boiling water for five minutes, stirring occasionally.
Add a few drops of onion juice if desired.
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.
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Turnip + oniontop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together7,585 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
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Turnip + peppertop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,252 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
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Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together68,474 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Cream + oniontop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together10,827 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).
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Pepper + creamtop 23% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together21,449 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Cream and onion barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 10,827 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
Swap the onion
The recipe marks onion as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turnip, pepper, cream, egg):
- Leekfits better
- Spinachfits better
- Horseradishfits better
- Onionthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against turnip, pepper, cream, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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