Skip to main content
Main

A Curry

A veal curry made with butter, onions, curry powder, milk, and lemon juice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

A Curry

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the meat into small square pieces, the size of a walnut.

Make the curry

  1. Melt the butter in a stew pan and add the onions; stew until they begin to brown.

  2. Add the meat and curry powder to the stew pan.

  3. Pour in the milk and let it stew for 20 to 30 minutes.

  4. Just before serving, add the lemon juice and bring to a gentle boil.

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 + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

  4. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  5. Veal + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal
Provides the main protein, which becomes tender during slow stewing in the milk.
Onions
Soften and brown in butter, adding sweetness and savory depth to the sauce.
Curry powder
Supplies the spice blend that gives the dish its characteristic flavor and aroma.
Milk
Forms a creamy liquid that mellows the spices and keeps the meat moist as it stews.
Fresh butter
Carries the spices and onions and adds richness to the sauce.

The step that matters

Adding the milk and stewing gently. Milk can scorch or curdle if it boils hard over direct heat, so it should simmer gently and not be allowed to rapidly boil while the meat cooks.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, butter, milk, lemon):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, butter, milk, lemon. 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.

More veal curry recipes

Soup 15 See all 34 →

You might also like

Lemon SauceLemon Sauce236 recipesVeal PattiesVeal Patties50 recipesBeef, Mutton, or Veal BrothBeef, Mutton, or Veal Broth6 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipes