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To Stew Young Peas and Lettuce

A stew of peas and lettuce cooked with salt, pepper, butter, gravy, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 622 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

To Stew Young Peas and Lettuce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the lettuce

  1. Wash and clean the lettuce, removing the outer leaves.

  2. Soak the lettuce in cold water with salt for 2 hours.

  3. Slice the soaked lettuce and place it in a saucepan.

Stew

  1. Add the peas, gravy, butter, pepper, salt, and sugar to the saucepan.

  2. Cover and stew until the peas are soft.

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. Cabbage + lettucetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together622 recipes

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

  2. Lettuce + peastop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,293 recipes

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

  3. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Cabbage + peastop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together392 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Cabbage lettuce
Forms the bulk of the stew and softens as it cooks, becoming tender.
Fresh peas
Provide the main body and sweetness of the stew as they cook until soft.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, giving the stew a smooth, rounded mouthfeel.
Gravy
Adds savoury depth and moisture to the stew.

The step that matters

Cover and stew until the peas are soft. Cooking gently under a lid holds in moisture so the peas and lettuce soften evenly without drying out or scorching. Stopping too early leaves the peas firm, while overcooking turns them mushy and dull in colour.

Swap the peas

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

  1. Chestnutfits better
  2. Beansfits better
  3. Walnutfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, lettuce, butter, pepper, sugar. 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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