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Broiled Mushrooms

Broiled mushrooms with butter, parsley, onion, stock, and red wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Broiled Mushrooms

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Remove the gills from the mushrooms, leaving the stalks on, and wash them well.

  2. Place the mushrooms upside down on a sieve to drain.

Cook

  1. In a saucepan, melt the butter with the chopped parsley and onion over medium heat for 1 minute.

  2. Arrange the mushrooms stalk-side up on a baking pan and pour the butter mixture over them.

  3. Season with coarse sea salt and black pepper, then broil in the oven at 400 °F (200 °C) until done.

Finish

  1. Add the stock to the mushrooms and bring to a boil.

  2. Serve hot, pouring the cooking liquid over the mushrooms.

  3. An hour and a quarter before serving, add the red wine to the cooking liquid.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  4. Mushroom + red winetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together720 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-methylphenol (smoky, clove).

  5. Mushroom + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,626 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

Mushrooms
Form the main body of the dish and soften into tender, juicy caps as they cook.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavour and helping the mushroom surfaces brown under heat.
Onion
Contributes savoury aroma and sweetness as it softens in the melted butter.
Red wine
Adds acidity and depth, deepening the colour and flavour of the cooking liquid.
Stock
Supplies moisture and savoury body to the liquid that surrounds the mushrooms.

The step that matters

Broiling until done. Under a broiler the surface heats fast, so mushrooms can dry out or scorch before the centres soften. Watching closely keeps them moist and evenly cooked.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mushroom, butter, parsley, pepper, red wine):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, butter, parsley, pepper, red wine. 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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