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Colored Dry Beans

A stew of soaked beans, bacon, onions, wine, and butter, seasoned with salt, pepper, flour, and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Colored Dry Beans

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beans

  1. Soak the beans in cold water for 6 hours, then wash and drain them.

  2. In a stewpan, cook the bacon over medium heat for 5 minutes.

  3. Add the beans, onions, salt, and pepper.

  4. Boil gently until cooked, then drain.

Finish in butter and wine

  1. Melt the butter in a clean stewpan over medium heat.

  2. Sprinkle in the flour and chopped parsley.

  3. Add the drained beans.

  4. Toss the beans occasionally for 10 minutes.

  5. Add the claret wine and the reserved cooking water.

  6. Boil gently for 20 minutes.

  7. Stir in the bacon and onions.

  8. Boil for an additional 5 minutes.

  9. Serve the mixture on a dish.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Beans + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,242 recipes

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

  3. Beans + parsleytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,376 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  4. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  5. Beans + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,733 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Colored dry beans
Form the main body of the dish, becoming tender through soaking and long gentle boiling.
Bacon
Adds smoky, savory fat that flavors the beans and the cooking liquid.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that carries flavor when the beans are tossed.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid slightly, giving the sauce body.
Claret wine
Adds acidity and depth to the liquid as it reduces around the beans.

The step that matters

Boil gently until cooked. Dry beans need a long, gentle simmer to soften fully; a hard boil can break the skins and leave the beans mushy and uneven.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beans, pepper, butter, flour, parsley, wine):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beans, pepper, butter, flour, parsley, 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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