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Green Peas a LA Prancaise

A dish of fresh green peas cooked with butter, water, lettuce, onion, parsley, sugar, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Lettuce and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,483 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Green Peas a LA Prancaise

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the peas

  1. Combine the peas and ¼ pound of butter in a pan, then add 2 quarts of cold water.

  2. Rub the peas and butter together with your fingers until well mixed.

  3. Pour off the water.

Stew

  1. Transfer the peas to a stewpan and add the shredded lettuce, chopped onion, parsley, powdered sugar, and salt.

  2. Cover and stew gently for 30 minutes.

Finish

  1. Knead together 2 ounces of butter and 2 teaspoons of flour on a plate.

  2. Add this mixture to the peas and toss until well combined.

  3. Remove the parsley and onion, but leave the lettuce in.

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. Lettuce + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,483 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Peas + lettucetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,293 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  3. Lettuce + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,562 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Lettuce + flourtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,236 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

Fresh green peas
Form the main body of the dish, cooked gently until tender.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel to the peas.
Hearts of lettuce
Softens as it stews, adding moisture and a mild, sweet body to the peas.
Flour
Kneaded with butter, it thickens the cooking liquid into a light coating.
Powdered sugar
Adds gentle sweetness that balances the savory onion and salt.

The step that matters

Cover and stew gently for 30 minutes. Gentle heat keeps the peas tender and bright green; a hard boil toughens the skins and turns them dull. Covering holds in steam so the peas cook evenly in their own moisture.

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, lettuce, onion, parsley, sugar, flour):

  1. Chickpeafits better
  2. Chestnutfits better
  3. Cashew nutfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, lettuce, onion, parsley, sugar, 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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