Why it works: Cucumber and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,174 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓
Cucumbers a LA Creme
Ingredients
Directions
Cook the cucumbers
Boil the cucumbers in salted water until tender.
Drain the cucumbers well.
Finish in the sauce
Stew the cucumbers in a thick bechamel sauce for a few minutes.
Serve the cucumbers in the bechamel sauce.
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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Cucumber + saucetop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,174 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Cucumbers
- Become tender when boiled, forming the main body of the dish.
- Bechamel sauce
- Thick sauce that coats the cucumbers and gives the dish its creamy texture.
The step that matters
Drain the cucumbers well. Cucumbers hold a lot of water. Any left on them after boiling will thin the thick bechamel sauce and dilute its texture and flavour during stewing.
“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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