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Green Turtle and Terrapin

A stew of terrapin meat with butter, onion, egg yolks, corn starch, cream, soy sauce, sherry, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Green Turtle and Terrapin

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Fry the grated onion in butter in a saucepan.

  2. Rub half the terrapin liver smooth with egg yolks and corn-starch, then add it to the onion and butter.

  3. Stir in the terrapin meat, cream, soy sauce, and salt.

  4. Cook while stirring until it begins to boil.

  5. Add sherry and serve immediately in a hot chafing dish.

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. Cream + saucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Onion + corntop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,205 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  4. Butter + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,505 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Butter + corntop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,345 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Terrapin meat
Forms the main body of the stew as the protein base.
Egg yolks
Emulsify with the liver and thicken the stew into a smooth, rich texture.
Corn-starch
Thickens the liquid as it heats, giving the stew body.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, velvety texture.
Butter
Carries the onion flavour and adds fat for richness.

The step that matters

Cook while stirring until it begins to boil. Corn-starch thickens only when heated to a boil, and stirring keeps it dispersed so it does not clump or scorch on the bottom. Stop once it thickens to avoid curdling the cream and egg yolks.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, butter, egg, corn, cream, sauce, sherry):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, butter, egg, corn, cream, sauce, sherry. 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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