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Butter, Green

A green butter made with herbs, capers, gherkin, and egg yolk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Tarragon and chervil match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 824 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Butter, Green

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the herbs finely.

  2. In a bowl, combine the chopped herbs, egg yolk, butter, capers, gherkin, salt, cayenne, and anchovy essence if using.

  3. Pound the mixture thoroughly and pass it through a fine sieve.

Chill

  1. Set the mixture aside to firm up in the refrigerator, especially in hot weather.

  2. For variations, consider adding cream or salad oil, garlic, or tarragon vinegar.

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. Tarragon + cherviltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together824 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Chervil + caperstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together135 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Tarragon + caperstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together379 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Tarragon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Parsley + caperstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,550 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Provides fat and richness, and firms up when chilled to hold its shape.
Hard-boiled egg yolk
Emulsifies with the butter and gives the mixture a smooth, creamy body.
Capers
Add briny acidity that cuts through the richness of the butter.
Tarragon
Contributes its distinctive aromatic, anise-like flavour.

The step that matters

Pound the mixture thoroughly and pass it through a fine sieve. Thorough pounding breaks down the herbs and blends the yolk into the butter, while sieving removes fibrous bits so the texture stays smooth rather than grainy or stringy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, butter, tarragon, chervil, parsley, capers, pepper):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, butter, tarragon, chervil, parsley, capers, pepper. 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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