Skip to main content
Main

Artichoke Bottoms, with Fine Herbs

Artichoke bottoms stuffed with fine herbs, bread crumbs, mushrooms, and butter, baked in brown gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Artichoke Bottoms, with Fine Herbs

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Prepare the artichokes by removing the leaves and trimming the bottoms.

  2. Stuff the artichokes with the cooked fine herbs, fresh bread crumbs, and chopped mushrooms.

Bake and serve

  1. Place them in a deep flat saucepan, adding a small piece of butter to each.

  2. Moisten with the light thickened brown gravy.

  3. Bake in a 300°F (150°C) oven, basting frequently with the gravy.

  4. When nicely browned, serve with the gravy.

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

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

  2. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Artichoke + mushroomtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together447 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  4. Bread + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Artichoke + breadtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together175 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Artichokes
Form the edible base that holds the stuffing and absorbs the gravy as it cooks.
Fresh bread crumbs
Add bulk and soak up moisture to give the stuffing a soft, cohesive texture.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that helps the stuffed artichokes brown in the oven.
Light thickened brown gravy
Keeps the artichokes moist and flavourful while basting and adds savoury depth.
Chopped fresh mushrooms
Contribute savoury, earthy flavour and moisture to the stuffing.

The step that matters

Basting in the oven. Basting with the gravy during baking keeps the stuffing and artichoke base moist while the surface browns. Without it, the exposed stuffing can dry out and brown unevenly before the artichoke is heated through.

“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.

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesWhite BreadWhite Bread80 recipesBread OmeletteBread Omelette60 recipesMushroom SoupMushroom Soup60 recipes