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Asparagus Sauce, for Lamb Chops

A sauce made from boiled asparagus, veal gravy, egg yolks, butter, and lemon, seasoned with salt and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Asparagus Sauce, for Lamb Chops

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the asparagus

  1. Cut the tender points of young asparagus into half‑inch lengths.

  2. Wash the asparagus well and drain.

Cook

  1. Boil in plenty of salted water until tender, about 10 to 15 minutes.

  2. Drain thoroughly in a hot strainer.

Finish the sauce

  1. Mix the asparagus with thickened veal gravy and egg yolks, seasoning with salt and cayenne or white pepper.

  2. Alternatively, mix with melted butter and add a squeeze of lemon juice before serving.

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 + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Asparagus + lemontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together704 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

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

  4. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  5. Veal + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Young asparagus
Provides the main body and vegetal flavour of the sauce once cooked and mashed.
Thickened veal gravy
Adds savoury depth and body to the asparagus base.
Egg yolks
Enrich the mixture and thicken it through gentle heat and emulsification.
Melted butter
Adds richness and a smooth, glossy mouthfeel as an alternative finish.
Lemon juice
Adds brightness and acidity that lifts the buttery richness.

The step that matters

Drain thoroughly in a hot strainer. Residual water dilutes the sauce and makes it thin, so the asparagus should be well drained before it is mixed with the gravy, yolks or butter.

Swap the asparagus

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, egg, pepper, butter, lemon):

  1. Asparagusthe original
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Spinachfits about as well
  4. Leekfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, egg, pepper, butter, lemon. 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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