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Peas a LA Frangaise

A pea dish cooked with butter, mint, eggs, cream, and sugar, finished with a thickened egg mixture.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Peas and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,293 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Peas a LA Frangaise

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Peel the onion.

  2. Cut the heart of the lettuce into fine shreds.

Cook the peas

  1. Melt the butter in a clean stewpan.

  2. Add the peas, pepper, salt, lettuce, onion, and mint, without adding water.

  3. Cover the pan.

  4. Cook gently for 20 to 30 minutes until the peas are tender.

  5. Remove the mint and onion from the pan.

Finish with egg

  1. Beat the egg yolks with the cream.

  2. Stir the mixture into the peas along with the sugar.

  3. Shake the pan until the mixture thickens.

  4. Do not let it boil after adding the eggs.

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. Peas + lettucetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,293 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  2. Onion + lettucetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,562 recipes

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

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  4. Lettuce + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,037 recipes

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

  5. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Shelled peas
Form the main body of the dish, cooking down to a tender, sweet base.
Lettuce
Adds moisture and a soft, silky texture as it wilts during gentle cooking.
Butter
Provides fat for gentle cooking and a rich, smooth mouthfeel.
Eggs
Thicken the mixture into a light, creamy coating when heated gently.

The step that matters

Do not let it boil after adding the eggs. Egg proteins set and curdle when overheated, so the mixture should be heated gently and only until it thickens. Boiling can make it grainy and split.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (peas, lettuce, egg, butter, cream, sugar, pepper):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against peas, lettuce, egg, butter, cream, sugar, pepper. 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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