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Crab Gumbo

A stew of crabs, beef, tomatoes, and gumbo spices simmered for hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Crab Gumbo

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Boil the crabs in 2 gallons of water.

  2. Strain the water and return it to the pot.

Simmer and finish

  1. Add the beef, gumbo, tomatoes, onion, red pepper, thyme, parsley, and black pepper.

  2. Cook for 6 hours.

  3. An hour before serving, add the crabs and a piece of butter.

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. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

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

  3. Pepper + thymetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Tomato + thymetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,370 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 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

Crabs
Provide the main seafood flavor and tender meat that finishes the gumbo.
Beef
Adds savory depth and body during the long simmer.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and moisture that give the gumbo its base flavor.
Onion
Adds sweetness and aromatic depth as it softens in the pot.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky finish to the gumbo.

The step that matters

Adding the crabs an hour before serving. Crab meat cooks quickly and becomes tough and stringy if simmered for hours. Adding it late keeps it tender while it still absorbs the broth's flavor.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (crab, beef, onion, pepper, thyme, parsley, butter):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Okrafits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against crab, beef, onion, pepper, thyme, parsley, butter. 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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