Why it works: Artichoke and butter work together. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 893 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓
Artichokes, to Boil
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Twist off the stalks of the artichokes and wash them in cold water.
Cook and serve
When the water boils, add the artichokes tops downwards.
Boil for 1.5 to 2 hours.
Serve with melted butter.
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.
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Artichoke + buttertop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together893 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Artichokes
- Form the main body of the dish, becoming tender and edible as they cook through.
- Melted butter
- Adds richness and fat, balancing the mild, slightly bitter flavour of the artichokes.
The step that matters
Boiling for the full time. Artichokes need a long, steady boil for the thick base and fleshy leaves to become tender. Stopping early leaves them tough and fibrous, so test a leaf or the base with a knife before draining.
“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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