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Pe.a.s Stewed with Mint

A stew of cabbage lettuce hearts, peas, mint, ham, onion, butter, and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

Pe.a.s Stewed with Mint

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the hearts of the lettuces small.

  2. In a stewpan, combine the lettuces, peas, and chopped mint.

  3. Add pepper and coarse sea salt.

  4. Mix in the butter without bruising the peas.

  5. Add pumped water, ham, and onion.

Stew and finish

  1. Stew on the fire for 20 minutes, shaking the pan to prevent burning.

  2. Remove the ham and onion.

  3. Add more butter rolled in flour and cream.

  4. Boil for 5 minutes and stir in the pounded sugar.

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. Cabbage + lettucetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together622 recipes

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

  3. Lettuce + peastop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,293 recipes

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

  4. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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 provide its sweet, fresh flavour.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, silky texture to the finished stew.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and with flour helps thicken the liquid.
Cabbage lettuces
Soften during stewing and add bulk and moisture to the dish.
Loaf sugar
Adds sweetness to balance the savoury stew and the mint.

The step that matters

Stew on the fire, shaking the pan. Stewing gently with the pan shaken keeps the peas and lettuce from scorching on the base of the pan while they soften. Without shaking, the bottom can burn before the vegetables cook through.

Swap the mint

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

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Mintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, lettuce, peas, pepper, butter, egg, ham. 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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