Name: Winter Succotash
Ingredients: 1 cup Shaker corn, soaked overnight; 1 cup Lima or butter beans, soaked overnight; ½ pound pork, cut into small pieces; ½ cup rich cream or sweet milk; 1 tablespoon butter (if using milk); Salt, to taste; Pepper, to taste; 1 teaspoon white sugar

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Winter Succotash

Ingredients

1 cup Shaker corn, soaked overnight
1 cup Lima or butter beans, soaked overnight
½ pound pork, cut into small pieces
½ cup rich cream or sweet milk
1 tablespoon butter (if using milk)
Salt, to taste
Pepper, to taste
1 teaspoon white sugar

Directions

Prepare

Soak the Shaker corn and beans overnight in lukewarm water.
The next morning, drain the beans and corn.

Cook and serve

In a kettle, combine the beans, corn, and pork with just enough water to cook.
Before serving, stir in the cream or milk and butter if using.
Season with salt, pepper, and sugar, then boil and serve.

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.

Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Corn + porktop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,069 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Corn + milktop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,955 recipes

Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

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

What each ingredient does

Shaker corn: Provides the main body and sweet corn flavor of the dish.
Lima or butter beans: Add creamy texture and substance, becoming tender after soaking and cooking.
Pork: Adds savory, rich flavor to the cooking liquid and beans.
Rich cream or sweet milk: Adds moisture and richness, giving the dish a smoother, creamier texture.

The step that matters

Stir in the cream or milk before serving. Dairy added at the end is not boiled for long, so it stays fresh-tasting and creamy. Boiling it hard after adding can cause it to curdle or separate, and the sweetness and richness are lost.

“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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Winter Succotash