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Asparagus, Vinaigrette

A plated dish of boiled asparagus served with vinaigrette, poached eggs on toast, and meat glaze.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Asparagus, Vinaigrette

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the asparagus

  1. Prepare the asparagus and boil it.

  2. Chill the boiled asparagus in the refrigerator until very cold.

  3. Tie the asparagus stems two inches from the tips and cut off the tips to a length of three inches.

  4. Blanch the tips in salted water.

Cook the tips

  1. Sauté the blanched tips in butter with a little béchamel sauce.

Assemble and serve

  1. Place the tips in the center of a large platter.

  2. Surround the tips with poached eggs on toast.

  3. Sprinkle the assembly with meat glaze.

  4. Serve the whole asparagus on a lettuce leaf with vinaigrette sauce.

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 + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Asparagus + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together363 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  4. Bread + meattop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,924 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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

What each ingredient does

Asparagus
Provides the main vegetable body and fresh green flavour of the dish.
Butter
Adds fat and richness when the tips are sautéed, helping them brown lightly.
Bechamel sauce
Adds a creamy, binding coating that gives the sautéed tips a smooth texture.
Poached eggs
Add soft, runny yolk that enriches the dish and moistens the asparagus.
Bread for toast
Gives a crisp, absorbent base that holds the eggs.
Meat glaze
Adds concentrated savoury flavour and a glossy finish over the assembly.

The step that matters

Chilling the boiled asparagus until very cold. Cooling stops the cooking so the asparagus stays bright green and firm rather than turning dull and soft from residual heat. Thorough chilling keeps the texture crisp for later sautéing and serving.

Swap the asparagus

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sauce, egg, bread, meat):

  1. Shallotfits about as well
  2. Asparagusthe original
  3. Mustardfits about as well
  4. Capsicumfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sauce, egg, bread, meat. 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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