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Green Peas

A simple dish of green peas cooked with butter and lettuce leaves.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Green Peas

Why it works: Peas and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,293 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Green Peas

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Place several outside leaves of lettuce in the bottom of a saucepan.

  2. Add the peas and butter to the pan.

Cook and serve

  1. Cover the pan tightly and place it over the fire.

  2. Cook for 30 minutes until ready to serve.

  3. Season the peas in the pan or remove them to season.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Peas + lettucetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,293 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  2. Peas + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,887 recipes

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

  3. Butter + lettucetop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

What each ingredient does

Green peas
Form the main body of the dish, giving it bulk and their sweet, tender texture when cooked.
Butter
Adds fat and moisture, enriching the peas and helping them cook gently in the covered pan.
Lettuce leaves
Lie under the peas, adding moisture and a mild, sweet, gentle flavour as they steam.

The step that matters

Cook tightly covered for 30 minutes. A tight lid traps steam so the peas cook in their own moisture. If the lid lets steam escape or the heat is too high, the pan can dry out and scorch before the peas are tender.

Swap the lettuce

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (peas, butter):

  1. Asparagusfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Lettucethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against peas, 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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