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Celery, Stewed

A stewed celery dish thickened with flour and butter, served over toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Celery, Stewed

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and cook

  1. Slice the celery, ensuring the root is cut into smaller pieces for even cooking.

  2. Cover the celery with boiling water or stock, add salt and peppercorns, and herbs if desired.

  3. Cook until nearly done and most of the liquid is absorbed.

Thicken and serve

  1. Stir in milk, flour, and butter for thickening.

  2. Serve the celery on toast, pouring the sauce 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.

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 + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 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. Parsley + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 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 bulk of the dish and softens as it stews until tender.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid into a smooth sauce as it combines with butter and milk.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that carries flavour and helps give the sauce a silky body.
Milk
Adds creaminess and body to the sauce, mellowing the savoury stock.

The step that matters

Stir in milk, flour, and butter for thickening. Flour needs to be fully incorporated and cooked through with the butter and liquid, or the sauce can taste raw and feel lumpy. Stirring steadily as the sauce thickens keeps it smooth.

Swap the parsley

The recipe marks parsley as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (celery, flour, butter, milk):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Parsleythe original
  4. Cardamomfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against celery, flour, butter, 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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