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Green Peas

A simple side dish of boiled green peas seasoned with sugar, butter, milk, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Green Peas

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Green Peas

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Shell and wash the green peas.

Cook the peas

  1. Boil the peas in water for 20 minutes, adding sugar if they are not very young and tender.

  2. Ensure most of the water evaporates during boiling.

Season and serve

  1. Season with salt, pepper, butter, and heated milk or cream.

  2. Heat the milk or cream to boiling point before serving.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Peas + peppertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,331 recipes

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

  3. Peas + milktop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,309 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  4. Peas + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,887 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Green peas
Provide the main body and sweet, vegetal flavor of the dish.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel to the cooked peas.
Milk or cream
Adds moisture and creaminess, softening the texture of the peas.
Sugar
Adds sweetness, which can balance older, starchier peas.

The step that matters

Ensure most of the water evaporates during boiling. Leaving too much water makes the peas watery and dilutes the seasoning. Reducing the liquid concentrates the flavor and lets the milk or cream and butter form a thicker, more cohesive dish.

Swap the peas

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

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Cocoafits better
  3. Walnutfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, pepper, butter, milk. 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.

More green peas recipes

Boiled 92Stewed 36Preserved 26Creamed 22Soup 14French 13 See all 150 →

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