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Frogs' Legs Stewed

A stew of frogs' legs with onion, ham, green pepper, tomato, rice, cream, and egg yolks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and rice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,065 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Frogs' Legs Stewed

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the frogs' legs

  1. In a saucepan, melt 2 tablespoons of butter and gently fry the frogs' legs.

  2. Add the onion, ham, green pepper, tomato, rice, hot water, and cream.

  3. Boil until the frogs' legs are cooked through.

Make the gravy

  1. Remove the frogs' legs from the pan and strain the gravy.

  2. Mix the strained gravy with the beaten egg yolks until creamy.

Serve

  1. Place the frogs' legs in a serving dish and pour the gravy over them 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.

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. Tomato + ricetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,065 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Onion + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

  5. Onion + ricetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,433 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the gravy, giving it a creamy texture when gently combined.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, velvety body to the gravy.
Butter
Provides fat for gentle frying, adding flavour and light browning to the frogs' legs.
Onion
Contributes savoury aroma and sweetness as it cooks into the liquid.
Tomato
Adds acidity and fresh flavour that balances the rich cream and yolks.
Raw ham
Adds salty, savoury depth to the cooking liquid.

The step that matters

Adding the egg yolks to the gravy. Egg yolks thicken by setting when heated. If the gravy is too hot or boils after the yolks go in, they can scramble and turn grainy. Mixing gently and keeping the gravy below a boil keeps it smooth and creamy.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, butter, ham, pepper, rice, cream, egg):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, butter, ham, pepper, rice, cream, 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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