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American Yams K LA Fran9aise

A dish of sliced yams simmered with butter, salt, nutmeg, and water, topped with a creamy butter‑flour sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,318 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

American Yams K LA Fran9aise

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the yams

  1. Cut the yams into slices about ½ inch thick and trim into oval shapes.

  2. Place the sliced yams in a pan full of water.

  3. Wash the yams.

  4. Drain the yams on a cloth.

Cook the yams

  1. In a stewpan, combine yams with butter, salt, nutmeg, and water.

  2. Cover and simmer for 45 minutes, turning occasionally until bright yellow on both sides.

  3. Arrange yams in a circle on a serving dish.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. Melt 1 ounce of butter in a stewpan.

  2. Add flour to the melted butter.

  3. Add cream, sugar, salt, and lemon juice.

  4. Stir the sauce over heat until it thickens.

  5. Pour the sauce over the yams.

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. Nutmeg + lemontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

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

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Sauce + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Yams (in the method)
Form the main body of the dish, softening as they simmer until tender.
Butter
Adds richness and flavour to both the yams and the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the melted butter and cream into a smooth sauce.
Cream
Gives the sauce body, richness and a silky texture.

The step that matters

Stirring the sauce while it thickens. Flour must be cooked in the melted butter and stirred over heat so it gelatinises evenly; otherwise the sauce can turn lumpy or taste floury. Keep the heat moderate so the cream does not scorch or split.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, nutmeg, sauce, flour, cream, sugar):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Coconutfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, nutmeg, sauce, flour, cream, sugar. 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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