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Asparagus a LA Brancais

A dish of boiled asparagus mixed with onion, egg yolk, salt, pepper, and melted butter, served on toasted bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Asparagus a LA Brancais

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Boil the asparagus and chop the heads and tender parts of the stalks with the boiled onion.

  2. Add salt, pepper, and the beaten egg yolk, then heat the mixture.

  3. Serve on slices of toasted bread and pour melted butter over it.

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 + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Asparagus + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,212 recipes

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

  3. Asparagus + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,968 recipes

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

  4. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  5. Asparagus + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together363 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Asparagus
Forms the main body of the dish, providing its vegetable flavor and bulk.
Egg yolk
Thickens the mixture when heated and adds richness and a smooth texture.
Melted butter
Adds fat and richness, carrying flavor over the toasted bread.
Toasted bread
Gives a crisp base that soaks up the mixture and butter.

The step that matters

Heating the mixture with the egg yolk. Egg yolk thickens as it warms, but if heated too fast or too long it can scramble and turn grainy. Heat gently and stir so the mixture becomes smooth and creamy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (asparagus, pepper, egg, butter, bread):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against asparagus, pepper, egg, butter, bread. 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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