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Jerusalem Artichokes, a LA Reine

Jerusalem artichokes cooked in milk and water, topped with a béchamel sauce flavored with mace and sea salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Jerusalem artichoke and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 116 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Jerusalem Artichokes, a LA Reine

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash and wipe the artichokes.

  2. Cut one end of each artichoke flat and trim the other end to a point.

Cook and serve

  1. Boil the artichokes in a mixture of milk and water until done.

  2. Remove the artichokes and place them upright in a serving dish.

  3. Sauce the artichokes with a béchamel or a mixture of cream thickened with flour and butter.

  4. Season the sauce with a pinch of mace and coarse sea salt.

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. Jerusalem artichoke + flourtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together116 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  4. Jerusalem artichoke + creamtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together182 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

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

Jerusalem artichokes
Provide the main vegetable, which becomes tender and mild when boiled.
Milk
Cooks the artichokes gently while adding a mild, creamy richness.
Cream
Forms the rich sauce, adding fat and smooth body to the dish.
Flour
Thickens the cream into a sauce by swelling with heat.
Butter
Adds fat and flavour, and helps thicken the sauce with flour.

The step that matters

Thickening the sauce. Flour must be cooked with butter and liquid so that starch swells smoothly. Undercooked flour leaves a raw, pasty taste and a grainy texture.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Cinnamonfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against jerusalem artichoke, milk, cream, flour, 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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