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With Cucumbers, or a Purine, or Green Parsley

A stew of fillet with bacon, carrots, onions, white wine, and broth, garnished with cucumbers or green parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

With Cucumbers, or a Purine, or Green Parsley

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Braise

  1. In a stewpan, add bacon, parsley, salt, pepper, carrots, onions, and white wine.

  2. Place the fillet on top and cover with broth.

  3. Cook in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 30 minutes with coals on the lid.

  4. Reduce heat and finish cooking.

Serve

  1. Transfer the meat to a dish and strain the sauce over it.

  2. Garnish with cucumbers or green parsley.

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. Parsley + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Parsley + cucumbertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,564 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

Bacon
Adds smoky, salty fat that flavours the braising liquid and the meat.
Onions
Break down during cooking to add sweetness and body to the sauce.
Carrots
Release sweetness and aroma into the braising liquid as they cook.
White wine
Adds acidity that helps lift and balance the rich flavours of the sauce.
Fillet
The main cut of meat, which becomes tender through slow, moist cooking.

The step that matters

Reduce heat and finish cooking. Once the liquid is simmering in the oven, too much heat can toughen the meat and evaporate the braising liquid too fast. Lower heat keeps the fillet tender and the sauce from reducing too much.

Swap the cucumber

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (parsley, pepper, carrot, onion, white wine):

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Turnipfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Cucumberthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against parsley, pepper, carrot, onion, white wine. 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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