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Brussels Sprouts

A simple dish of boiled Brussels sprouts served on buttered toast with melted butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Brussels Sprouts

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Brussels Sprouts

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the sprouts

  1. Remove discolored leaves from the Brussels sprouts and cut the stems evenly.

  2. Wash the sprouts thoroughly.

Cook and serve

  1. Boil the sprouts in salted water for 8 to 10 minutes.

  2. Drain the sprouts well.

  3. Toast the bread and butter both sides.

  4. Serve the sprouts on the buttered toast and accompany with melted butter.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Brussels sprouts + buttertop 34% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together20 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  3. Brussels sprouts + breadtop 77% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together0 recipes

    Shared aroma: cis-3-hexenol (green, grassy).

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

What each ingredient does

Brussels sprouts
Provide the main vegetable; boiling softens them until tender throughout.
Butter
Adds richness and flavor to the toast and carries the dish's savory fat.

The step that matters

Drain the sprouts well. Excess water left on boiled sprouts dilutes the buttered toast and makes it soggy, so they should be drained thoroughly before serving.

Swap the brussels sprouts

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

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Tomatofits better
  4. Brussels sproutsthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, butter. 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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