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Turnips in White Sauce

Turnips in White Sauce is a dish of boiled turnips served with a thick white sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Turnips in White Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and cook

  1. Cut turnips into quarters and shape them into balls or plums.

  2. Arrange turnips in a saucepan and cover with veal broth.

  3. Add salt and a little sugar, then boil until tender but unbroken.

Serve

  1. Drain turnips and place them on a dish.

  2. Pour thick white sauce over the turnips 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. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  2. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Cream + saucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Sugar + saucetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,147 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Turnips
Form the main body of the dish and soften into a tender vegetable when simmered.
Veal broth
Adds savory flavor and moisture while the turnips simmer.
Butter
Adds richness and a rounded, savory flavor to the dish.
Thick white sauce
Thickens and coats the turnips with a smooth, creamy layer.
Cream or milk
Adds moisture and creaminess, making the sauce smoother and richer.
Sugar
Adds a little sweetness that balances the turnips' natural bitterness.

The step that matters

Boil until tender but unbroken. Heat softens the turnip's cell walls and starches, but prolonged boiling makes them fall apart. Checking often and draining once tender keeps the pieces whole.

Swap the turnip

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, cream, veal, sugar, sauce):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Turnipthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, cream, veal, sugar, sauce. 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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