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Creamed Shrimps

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 18 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and onion match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,259 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Creamed Shrimps

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a chafing dish, cook 2 tablespoons of butter and 1 tablespoon of flour together until smooth.

  2. Add 1 cup of cream and stir until well combined.

  3. Incorporate the remaining ingredients: cheese, mustard, eggs, Worcestershire sauce, baking soda, crabs, onion, tomatoes, chili pepper, and water.

  4. Season with salt and cayenne to taste.

  5. Bring the mixture to a boil and serve immediately on buttered toast.

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. Mustard + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  3. Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Cream + crabtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together317 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetoin (butter, cream).

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

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cheese, cream, butter, mustard, egg, sauce, crab):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Chivefits about as well
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, cream, butter, mustard, egg, sauce, crab. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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