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Peas with Lettuce and Mint

A stew of peas, lettuce, onions, mint, and eggs, seasoned with pepper, salt, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Peas and mint are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,137 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-ol, which smells mushroom, earthy. The science ↓

Peas with Lettuce and Mint

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the vegetables

  1. Combine peas, butter, lettuce, onions, mint, and water in a saucepan.

  2. Cover and cook on low heat until the lettuce wilts.

  3. Shake the saucepan to keep peas on top.

  4. Season with pepper, salt, and sugar, then stew until peas are tender.

Finish and serve

  1. Beat egg yolks and whites together in a bowl.

  2. Pour the eggs over the peas and stir immediately to prevent scrambling.

  3. Serve hot, garnished with chopped parsley.

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. Peas + minttop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,137 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  2. Peas + lettucetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,293 recipes

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

  3. Lettuce + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,562 recipes

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

  4. Lettuce + minttop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together569 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

Peas
Form the body of the stew and become tender as they cook slowly.
Lettuce
Wilts down to add soft texture and moisture to the stew.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that carries flavour through the stew.
Egg yolks and whites
Set into the hot stew when poured in, thickening it and giving a silky body.
Onions
Soften as they cook, adding mild sweetness and savoury depth.

The step that matters

Pouring in the eggs. Egg proteins set with heat, so if the eggs are added to a very hot pan without constant stirring they can scramble into lumps instead of thickening the stew smoothly. Stirring immediately spreads the egg evenly so it sets as a silky mixture.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Cucumberfits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against peas, butter, lettuce, mint, pepper, sugar, egg. 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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