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Plain Gravy Kettle

A simple gravy made with ham, optional mushrooms, parsley, and onions, simmered slowly in broth.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 25,843 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Plain Gravy Kettle

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Add a small quantity of liquid to the stewpan with the ingredients and reduce by rapid boiling until a glaze forms.

  2. When the glaze has the proper color, gradually add the boiling broth while shaking the stewpan to detach the glaze.

  3. Add the ham and simmer gently for 3 to 4 hours with mushrooms, parsley, and green onions or a Portugal onion.

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. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Mushroom + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,626 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Mushroom + parsleytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,132 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Ham + mushroomtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,486 recipes

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

  5. Ham + oniontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,159 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Ham
Provides the main savory flavor and the glaze that builds the gravy's color and depth.
Boiling broth
Forms the liquid base of the gravy and loosens the browned glaze from the pan.
Green onions or portugal onion
Adds aromatic sweetness and savory depth as it simmers in the liquid.

The step that matters

Reducing the glaze. The glaze must be reduced by rapid boiling until it reaches the proper color. Browned, concentrated proteins and sugars give the gravy its color and depth, while pale or burnt glaze changes the flavor. Adding broth too early prevents the glaze from forming properly.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, mushroom, onion):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Celeryfits better
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, mushroom, onion. 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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