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Stewed Okra

A stew of okra cooked with butter, onion, green pepper, tomatoes, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley 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 ↓

Stewed Okra

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the okra and cut off the ends.

Make the stew

  1. In a saucepan, melt the butter and add the minced onion and chopped green pepper; cook for 6-8 minutes.

  2. Add the chopped tomatoes and their juice, then season with salt, pepper, cayenne, and parsley.

  3. Add the okra and let the mixture simmer slowly for 20-30 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve in a hot dish.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Okra + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together206 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Okra + tomatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together327 recipes

    Shared aroma: damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Okra + oniontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together715 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Okra
Forms the main body of the stew and thickens the liquid as it simmers.
Onion
Adds aromatic sweetness and savory depth as it softens in butter.
Tomatoes
Provide acidity, liquid, and the base of the sauce.
Green pepper
Contributes fresh, slightly bitter vegetable flavor and body to the stew.

The step that matters

Simmer the okra slowly. Okra releases a sticky mucilage when cooked. A gentle, slow simmer keeps the pieces tender and the sauce smooth, while a hard boil can make the texture stringy and the mixture stick to the pan.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (okra, butter, pepper, tomato, parsley):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against okra, butter, pepper, tomato, parsley. 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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