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Asparagus Gravy

A savory gravy made from cooked asparagus, water, almond butter, and flour, seasoned with salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Asparagus Gravy

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the asparagus

  1. Cook the asparagus until tender, then rub through a colander.

  2. In a bowl, combine the sifted asparagus with water.

Make the gravy

  1. Dissolve almond butter in a little hot water and add to the mixture.

  2. Season with salt to taste.

  3. Thicken the gravy with white flour until the desired consistency is reached.

  4. Serve the gravy over toast or vegetables.

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. Almond + flourtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Asparagus + almondtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together94 recipes

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

  3. Almond + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Asparagus + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together936 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Asparagus
Provides the main body and flavour of the gravy once cooked and sifted.
White flour
Thickens the liquid as it heats, giving the gravy body.
Almond butter
Adds richness and a nutty flavour to the gravy.

The step that matters

Thicken the gravy with white flour. Flour must be added gradually and stirred while the liquid is warm, otherwise it clumps and the gravy stays lumpy or uneven in texture.

Swap the asparagus

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

  1. Arrowrootfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Asparagusthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against almond, butter, 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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