Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
Split Pea Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Wash the peas and soak them overnight in 1 pint of cold water.
In the morning, drain and rinse the peas thoroughly.
Add 1½ quarts of cold water and the chopped onion to the peas.
Cook slowly until the peas are soft, then rub through a strainer.
Make a white sauce by melting butter, adding flour, and gradually whisking in milk.
Combine the strained pea liquid with the white sauce and cook until the desired consistency is reached.
Cooking a small ham bone with the peas improves the flavor.
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.
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together68,474 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + milktop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together42,912 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Swap the onion
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, pepper, milk, ham):
- Potatofits better
- Capsicumfits better
- Asparagusfits better
- Onionthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, pepper, milk, ham. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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