Why it works: Onion and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 42,912 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓
To Fry Onions
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Slice the onions to the thickness of a penny.
Cook
Place the sliced onions in a frying pan with boiling water and salt.
Boil for 3 to 4 minutes.
Drain dry.
Add butter to the pan and flour the onions.
Fry the onions until brown on both sides.
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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Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together42,912 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Onions
- Provide the main bulk and sweetness that caramelise into the dish when fried.
- Butter
- Adds fat for frying and a rich flavour that helps the onions brown.
The step that matters
Fry the onions until brown on both sides. Browning relies on the Maillard reaction and caramelisation at high surface heat. Onions must be dry and in an adequately hot pan, or they steam and turn grey and soft instead of golden.
“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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