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Cardoons, Vnth Marrow and Spanish Sauce

Cardoons simmered with consomme, Spanish sauce, and marrow, served with toasted bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Sauce and sugar match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,147 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Cardoons, Vnth Marrow and Spanish Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut off the leaves of the cardoons near the root, using only the white parts.

  2. Cut the cardoons into 5-6 inch pieces and trim the edges.

  3. Blanch the pieces until the slime can be rubbed off, then cool them in cold water.

Cook

  1. Place the cardoons in a stewpan with a blanc and let them boil, covered with buttered paper.

  2. Simmer on low heat for 3-4 hours until tender.

  3. Trim the cardoons and place them in a sauté pan with consomme, Spanish sauce, and a little sugar.

  4. Simmer until nearly glazed, then dish them up.

Garnish and serve

  1. Garnish with fancifully cut toasted bread and large pieces of marrow around the dish before serving.

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. Sauce + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,147 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Cardoon + breadtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Cardoon + saucetop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together48 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Sauce + breadtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,934 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Cardoon + sugartop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

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

What each ingredient does

Cardoons
Form the main body of the dish, becoming tender through long, gentle simmering.
Marrow
Adds rich, fatty flavour and a soft, buttery texture as a garnish.
Consomme
Provides a savoury liquid that flavours the cardoons as they reduce and glaze.
Spanish sauce
Adds depth and body to the braising liquid, coating the cardoons.
Sugar
Adds a touch of sweetness that balances the cardoons' natural bitterness.

The step that matters

Simmering until tender. Cardoons are fibrous and bitter, so they need long, low simmering to soften fully. Rushing with high heat can toughen the outside while the inside stays firm.

“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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