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Kohl Cannon

A dish of boiled greens mixed with butter, cream, and onion.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Kohl Cannon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the greens

  1. Boil the young sprouts or greens until tender, then press them dry.

  2. Chop the greens if necessary and mash them well.

Season and heat

  1. Add salt, pepper, butter, and cream or milk to the mashed greens.

  2. Place the raw onion in the center of the mixture and heat over a clear fire until hot.

  3. Ensure the mixture is dry enough to be molded or served in a dish.

  4. Remove the onion 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. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  3. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Cream + oniontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10,827 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  5. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

Cream and onion barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 10,827 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

Young sprouts or greens
Form the bulk of the dish and, once mashed, give it its body and texture.
Butter
Adds fat, richness and smoothness to the mashed greens.
Cream or milk
Adds moisture and softness, helping the mashed greens hold together smoothly.
Raw onion
Sits in the mixture while it heats, releasing aroma and flavor into the greens.

The step that matters

Drying the greens before mixing. Pressing the boiled greens dry removes excess water. If they stay wet, the cream and butter dilute the mixture, which then will not hold a shape or thicken properly when heated.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Spinachfits about as well
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, butter, cream. 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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