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To Stew Celery

A stew of celery simmered in stock, thickened with flour and butter, seasoned with pepper and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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To Stew Celery

Why it works: Celery and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

To Stew Celery

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the celery

  1. Wash and trim the celery.

  2. Boil the celery in boiling water for 5 minutes, then drain.

Stew and thicken

  1. Place the celery in a saucepan with stock to cover and stew gently for about 1 hour until tender.

  2. Thicken the gravy with flour and butter, then add pepper, salt, and browning for color.

  3. If desired, use white stock instead of brown and add milk when thickening the sauce.

Finish and serve

  1. Boil for an additional 15 minutes and serve the celery with the sauce poured over it.

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.

  1. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Celery + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,905 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Celery
Forms the main body of the dish and becomes tender during slow stewing.
Flour
Thickens the stock into a smooth gravy as it heats.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the flour blend smoothly into the sauce.
Milk
Adds creaminess and mild sweetness to the sauce when used.

The step that matters

Thicken the gravy with flour and butter. Flour must be cooked in fat before or as it meets the liquid, otherwise it clumps and stays starchy. Adding it to hot stock while stirring keeps the sauce smooth.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, pepper, milk):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Cardamomfits better
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, pepper, milk. 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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