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Asparagus

Boiled asparagus served on thick toast with melted butter and lemon juice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Asparagus and lemon work together. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 704 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Asparagus

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Remove loose leaves from asparagus and scrape the stalks.

  2. Wash the asparagus in cold water.

  3. Cut the stalks to the same length and tie them in small bundles with heads aligned.

Cook and serve

  1. Boil the asparagus in hot water with salt for about 20 minutes until tender, being careful not to break the heads.

  2. Serve the asparagus on a slice of thick toast dipped in the cooking water.

  3. Serve with melted butter mixed with a few drops of lemon juice.

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. Asparagus + lemontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together704 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Asparagus + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,026 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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 and becomes tender when boiled.
Thick toast
Absorbs the cooking water, giving a soft base that holds the asparagus.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that coats the asparagus and softens its flavour.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the buttery sauce and balances its richness.

The step that matters

Boiling the asparagus. Boiling for too long turns the stalks soft and dull, and rough handling breaks the tender heads. Cooking just until tender keeps the texture firm and the colour bright.

Swap the asparagus

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, lemon):

  1. Shallotfits about as well
  2. Asparagusthe original
  3. Leekfits about as well
  4. Arrowrootfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, lemon. 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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