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Savoury Peas with Ham

A savory dish of boiled peas with minced ham, butter, green onions, béchamel sauce, cream and seasonings, garnished with croutons.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Savoury Peas with Ham

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil and strain the peas.

Cook

  1. In a stewpan, melt the butter and fry the minced ham until tender.

  2. Add the minced green onions and the peas to the pan.

  3. Moisten with the béchamel sauce and cream.

  4. Season with salt, pepper, and castor sugar.

  5. Let simmer for 10 minutes.

Serve

  1. Turn out onto a dish, garnish with croutons, and serve.

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

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

  2. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Sauce + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  5. Peas + oniontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,460 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

Peas
Form the main body of the dish, giving it bulk and a fresh, sweet flavour.
Ham
Adds savoury, salty flavour and a firmer chewy bite against the soft peas.
Butter
Carries the flavour of the ham and onions and adds richness to the frying step.
Béchamel sauce
Adds creamy body and moisture, binding the peas and ham together.
Cream
Adds richness and a smoother, silkier texture to the sauce.

The step that matters

Simmer after adding the cream and béchamel. Simmering gently lets the liquid thicken slightly and coat the peas. Boiling hard can split the cream and make the sauce grainy or oily.

Swap the peas

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

  1. Beansfits better
  2. Chestnutfits better
  3. Pistachiofits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, butter, onion, sauce, cream, pepper, sugar. 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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