Why it works: Parsley and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 28,563 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓
Green Butter
Ingredients
Directions
Make the green butter
Wash and pick the parsley, then pound it thoroughly with the anchovies.
Rub the mixture through a sieve and mix it with the butter.
Shape and serve
Shape the mixture into small balls and serve with hot toast.
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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Parsley + buttertop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together28,563 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Parsley
- Provides the fresh green colour and herbal flavour that give the butter its character.
- Anchovies
- Add a savoury, salty depth that balances the richness of the butter.
- Butter
- Carries the herbs and anchovy and gives the mixture a rich, smooth body.
The step that matters
Rub the mixture through a sieve. Pounding alone leaves fibrous bits of parsley and anchovy. Pressing the mixture through a sieve breaks these down further, giving a smoother texture once it is combined with the butter.
“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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