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Puree Asparagus

A creamy asparagus puree made with butter, broth, and egg yolks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Puree Asparagus

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the asparagus

  1. Wash the asparagus.

  2. Parboil the asparagus for 4 minutes, then immerse it in cold water and drain it.

  3. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  4. Toss the asparagus gently over heat, then season it with salt, pepper, nutmeg, and a little sugar.

  5. Add enough broth to cook the asparagus thoroughly along with the parsley.

  6. Boil the asparagus until tender.

Make the puree

  1. Pound the asparagus through a colander.

  2. Combine the puréed asparagus with thickened chicken broth or cream in a saucepan.

  3. Heat the mixture while stirring until it boils.

  4. Reduce heat and simmer for 25 minutes.

  5. Skim the mixture.

  6. Strain the mixture through a fine sieve.

Finish and serve

  1. Keep the strained mixture warm in the saucepan.

  2. Add the butter.

  3. Add the diluted yolks of the eggs, stirring well.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Nutmeg + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Asparagus + parsleytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together566 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Asparagus + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,968 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Asparagus
Forms the main body of the puree and gives it its flavour and green colour.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel to the finished puree.
Thickened chicken broth or cream
Supplies liquid and body, giving the puree a smooth, spoonable consistency.
Egg yolks
Thicken the puree gently and add richness when stirred in at the end.

The step that matters

Adding the egg yolks. Egg yolks thicken by gentle heat. If the mixture is kept at a hard boil after the yolks go in, they can scramble and curdle, leaving the puree grainy instead of smooth.

Swap the asparagus

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, pepper, nutmeg, sugar, chicken, parsley, egg):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits about as well
  3. Shallotfits about as well
  4. Asparagusthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, pepper, nutmeg, sugar, chicken, parsley, egg. 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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