Why it works: Corn and lima beans work together. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 222 recipes. Both carry 2,3-pentanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓
Succotash
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Strip the kernels from the corn using a sharp knife.
In a saucepan, combine the corn, Lima beans, and veal stock or water.
Cook
Simmer steadily until the moisture is absorbed and the corn and beans are tender.
Add the milk, butter, pepper, and salt, and simmer until well combined.
Serve in a covered dish.
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.
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Corn + lima beanstop 3% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together222 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Corn + milktop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,955 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
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Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,324 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Lima beans + buttertop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together414 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Sweet corn
- Provides the main body and sweetness of the dish.
- Lima beans
- Add starchy substance and firm texture that holds up during simmering.
- Milk
- Adds moisture and creaminess to the finished dish.
- Butter
- Adds fat and richness, rounding out the flavor.
The step that matters
Simmer until the moisture is absorbed and the corn and beans are tender. Cooking long enough softens the starches in the corn and beans so they are tender, while letting the liquid reduce so the dish does not turn watery. Stopping early leaves the vegetables firm and the texture thin.
Swap the lima beans
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (corn, milk, butter, pepper, veal):
- Lima beansthe original
- Beansfits about as well
- Walnutfits about as well
- Peanutfits less well
Fit is the average pairing score against corn, milk, butter, pepper, veal. 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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