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Puree of Turnips

A creamy puree of cooked turnips blended with cream, butter, flour, eggs, and seasoned with salt, pepper, and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper 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 ↓

Puree of Turnips

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Pare and slice the turnips.

  2. Place them in a saucepan with cold water and add ½ teaspoon of coarse sea salt.

  3. Cook until tender, then drain.

Make the puree

  1. Mash the turnips and mix in the cream, butter, and sifted flour.

  2. Beat the eggs and stir them into the mixture.

  3. Season with salt and pepper, then serve garnished with 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 + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Turnip + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,842 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Turnip + flourtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  5. Turnip + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,252 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Turnips
Form the bulk of the puree, providing the main body and mild sweetness once cooked and mashed.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, giving the puree a smoother, softer texture.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a silkier mouthfeel in the mashed turnips.
Sifted flour
Thickens the mixture so the puree holds its shape rather than running loose.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and help it set lightly when gently heated, adding structure.

The step that matters

Cook the turnips until tender, then drain well. Turnips that are undercooked stay fibrous and grainy when mashed, while excess water left after draining thins the puree and dilutes its flavor and texture.

Swap the turnip

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

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Turnipthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, butter, flour, egg, parsley, 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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