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Carrots in Broivn Sauce

Carrots simmered in a brown sauce of gravy, Worcestershire, salt, pepper, and powdered sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,555 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Carrots in Broivn Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash and brush the carrots, then cut them into four lengthwise pieces about 3 inches long.

  2. Boil the carrots until tender, then drain them.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. In a stewpan, combine the carrots with salt, pepper, powdered sugar, brown gravy, and Worcestershire sauce.

  2. Stew gently for 10 minutes.

  3. Arrange the carrots in a star shape on a dish and pour the sauce over them.

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. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  2. Sugar + saucetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,147 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Carrot + saucetop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,509 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Pepper + saucetop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,303 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Carrot + sugartop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,211 recipes

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

Pepper and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,303 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Carrots
Provide the main body of the dish and absorb the flavour of the sauce as they stew.
Brown gravy
Supplies the moisture and savoury body that forms the sauce around the carrots.
Worcestershire sauce or mushroom ketchup
Adds savoury depth and a touch of acidity to the brown sauce.
Powdered sugar
Adds a little sweetness that balances the savoury, salty sauce.

The step that matters

Stew gently for 10 minutes. Gentle heat lets the carrots take on the sauce without breaking down. A hard boil can reduce the sauce too quickly and make it thick, dark, or scorched on the bottom of the pan.

Swap the carrot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, sugar, sauce):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Horseradishfits about as well
  4. Carrotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, sugar, sauce. 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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