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Carrots with Luau or Spinach

A boiled carrot dish served with spinach or luau, seasoned with sugar, butter, salt, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and spinach match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 870 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Carrots with Luau or Spinach

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the carrots

  1. Scrape the carrots.

  2. Chop the carrots using a coarse meat chopper.

  3. Boil the chopped carrots in salted water with ½ teaspoon of sugar until tender.

  4. Strain the carrots.

  5. Add 1 teaspoon of butter.

  6. Place in a hot dish.

Prepare the luau or spinach

  1. Wash the luau or spinach.

  2. Place it in boiling water with salt and a tiny pinch of baking soda.

  3. Boil for 10 minutes.

  4. Drain the water.

  5. Cover with boiling water again.

  6. Cook until tender.

  7. Strain.

  8. Chop.

  9. Add 1 teaspoon of butter.

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. Carrot + spinachtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together870 recipes

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

  2. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Butter + spinachtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,583 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  4. Carrot + buttertop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,083 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Carrot + sugartop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,211 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Carrots
Form the main body of the dish, becoming soft and tender when boiled.
Sugar
Adds sweetness to the carrots during boiling.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, giving the vegetables a smoother flavor and mouthfeel.
Luau or spinach
Serves as the leafy green vegetable, cooked until tender.
Baking soda
Raises the cooking water's alkalinity, helping the greens soften and keep a bright color.

The step that matters

Boil the luau or spinach in salted water with baking soda. A tiny pinch of baking soda raises the water's alkalinity, which helps greens soften and keep a bright color. Using too much can make the leaves mushy and give a soapy taste, so the pinch must stay small.

Swap the spinach

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

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Spinachthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, sugar, butter. 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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