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Bean and Lentil Puree

A puree made from beans, lentils, and a small veal or mutton bone, served warm.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Beans and lentils match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 135 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Bean and Lentil Puree

Ingredients

Directions

Cook

  1. Boil the small veal or mutton bone in water.

  2. Add the beans and lentils to the pot.

  3. Cook until the beans and lentils are soft.

Blend and serve

  1. Blend the mixture until smooth, ensuring it is not greasy.

  2. Serve warm.

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 + lentilstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together135 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Veal + beanstop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together158 recipes

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

  3. Veal + lentilstop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together18 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

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

What each ingredient does

Small veal or mutton bone
Releases flavour and body into the cooking water, giving the puree a savoury base.
Beans
Provide the bulk of the puree and, once soft, its thick, smooth body.
Lentils
Break down during cooking, helping the puree thicken and blend smooth.

The step that matters

Cook until the beans and lentils are soft. Beans and lentils must be fully softened before blending. Firm pieces stay grainy and resist breaking down, so the puree will not become smooth.

Swap the lentils

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, beans):

  1. Lima beansfits better
  2. Lentilsthe original
  3. Chestnutfits about as well
  4. Chickpeafits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, beans. 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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