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Boiled Beans and Peas

A simple boiled bean and pea dish seasoned with salt, pepper, fat, and optional tomato sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Beans and tomato match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,713 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Boiled Beans and Peas

Ingredients

Directions

Soak and boil

  1. Soak the beans or peas in soft water for 12 to 24 hours.

  2. Boil the soaked beans or peas in soft water for 2 to 3 hours.

Treat hard water

  1. If using hard water, add ½ teaspoon baking soda per quart of beans, pour off the water after 30 minutes, and replace with fresh boiling water.

Season and serve

  1. Once soft, season with salt, pepper, and fat.

  2. For added flavor, serve with tomato sauce or fruit.

  3. Discard the first boiling water and replenish the second water sparingly.

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. Beans + tomatotop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,713 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Beans + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,733 recipes

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

  4. Beans + buttertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,799 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Dried beans or peas
Provide the main body and starch that soften into a tender, thick dish.
Baking soda
Raises the water's alkalinity, helping beans soften when the water is hard.
Fat (butter or pork)
Adds richness and a smoother mouthfeel to the cooked beans.

The step that matters

Using baking soda with hard water. Minerals in hard water toughen bean skins and slow softening. Baking soda raises the water's alkalinity, which helps the beans soften. It is needed only with hard water, so measure it carefully.

“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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