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Dried Lima Beans

A method for cooking dried lima beans with butter, pepper, salt, and optional sweet cream or milk.

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 ↓

Dried Lima Beans

Ingredients

Directions

Soak and cook

  1. Soak the dried lima beans overnight.

  2. Cover the beans with water in a covered pot two hours before dinner.

  3. Cook slowly until tender.

Season

  1. Add butter, pepper, and salt to taste.

String beans variant

  1. For string beans, string and cut them into half‑inch pieces, wash, and cook in boiling water.

Finish

  1. Add 1 teaspoon of baking soda to 2 quarts of beans and boil for 15 minutes.

  2. Drain and cook in fresh boiling water until very tender.

  3. Add butter and pepper to taste, and stir in sweet cream or rich milk thickened with wheat flour if desired.

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. Wheat + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Lima beans + wheattop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).

  5. Butter + wheattop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

Dried lima beans
Form the main body of the dish, becoming tender and creamy when cooked slowly.
Baking soda
Raises the pot's alkalinity, helping the beans soften faster during the boil.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth mouthfeel to the finished beans.
Sweet cream or rich milk
Adds richness and body, forming a creamy sauce around the beans.
Wheat flour
Thickens the cream or milk so it coats the beans rather than running thin.

The step that matters

Add 1 teaspoon of baking soda to 2 quarts of beans and boil for 15 minutes.. Baking soda raises the cooking water's pH, which speeds softening of the beans' skins. Too much can leave beans mushy or soapy-tasting, so measure it carefully.

Swap the lima beans

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

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Walnutfits better
  3. Pistachiofits better
  4. Lima beansthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, pepper, cream, wheat, 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.

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