Name: Stewed Carrots
Ingredients: 4 medium carrots; 2 tablespoons butter; 2 cups stock; 2 tablespoons chopped parsley

Why it works: Carrot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Stewed Carrots

Ingredients

4 medium carrots
2 tablespoons butter
2 cups stock
2 tablespoons chopped parsley

Directions

Slice the carrots and fry them lightly in butter.
Cover the carrots with stock and let them stew gently until tender.
Remove the carrots and reduce the stock.
Add chopped parsley to the reduced stock and pour it over the carrots.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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.

Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together8,053 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together28,563 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Carrot + buttertop 24% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together10,083 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

Carrots: Provide the main body and sweetness, softening into tender pieces as they stew.
Butter: Adds fat and richness, and helps the carrots brown lightly when fried.
Stock: Supplies liquid for gentle stewing and, once reduced, a concentrated savory sauce.