Why it works: Spinach and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,400 recipes. Both carry nonanal, which smells fat, citrus. The science ↓
Cream of Spinach
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the spinach
Wash and clean the spinach thoroughly.
Boil the spinach in 5 quarts of salted boiling water for 25 minutes.
Drain the spinach in a colander and cool quickly by pouring cold water over it.
Squeeze out all the water from the spinach and chop it finely.
Make the cream of spinach
In a saucepan, melt 1 tablespoon of butter and cook the chopped spinach slowly for 6 minutes, stirring often.
Sprinkle 1 teaspoon of flour over the spinach and mix well.
Add ½ pint of rich cream and season with salt and pepper to taste.
Cook slowly for another 10 minutes.
Remove from heat and stir in 1 tablespoon of butter.
Serve
Serve in a hot vegetable dish and garnish with sliced hard boiled eggs.
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.
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Spinach + peppertop 6% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,400 recipes
Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
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Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Spinach + flourtop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,564 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 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
- Fresh spinach
- Forms the main body of the dish and gives it its green colour and vegetable flavour.
- Flour
- Thickens the cooking liquid so the cream coats the spinach rather than running off.
- Rich cream
- Adds fat and richness, giving the spinach a smooth, silky texture.
- Butter
- Adds fat and flavour, helping the spinach cook gently and finish with a rich taste.
The step that matters
Squeeze out all the water from the spinach. Excess water dilutes the cream and thins the sauce, so the spinach will not thicken properly. Squeezing it dry before cooking keeps the final texture thick and concentrated.
Swap the spinach
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, cream, pepper, egg):
- Spinachthe original
- Leekfits about as well
- Chivefits about as well
- Asparagusfits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, cream, pepper, egg. 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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