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Brussels Sprouts

A simple boiled Brussels sprouts dish seasoned with butter, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Brussels Sprouts

Why it works: Butter and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 85,593 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Brussels Sprouts

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the Brussels sprouts in plenty of cold water.

  2. Trim the stalks and remove any withered leaves.

  3. Soak the sprouts in clean cold water.

Cook

  1. Boil salted water with a small pinch of baking soda.

  2. Drain the sprouts and add them to the boiling water without a lid for about 10 minutes.

  3. Drain the sprouts again and return them to the pot.

Finish and serve

  1. Add ½ oz of butter, salt, and pepper to the sprouts.

  2. Gently shake the pot to coat the sprouts with butter.

  3. Serve the sprouts neatly piled on a dish.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

  2. Brussels sprouts + peppertop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35 recipes

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

  3. Brussels sprouts + buttertop 34% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together20 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

What each ingredient does

Brussels sprouts
Form the main body of the dish, cooking to a tender texture while staying green.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, coating the sprouts and carrying flavour across the surface.
Baking soda (in the method)
Raises the water's alkalinity, which helps the sprouts keep their green colour while boiling.

The step that matters

Boiling without a lid. Cooking uncovered lets volatile sulphur compounds escape, which keeps the sprouts from tasting strongly cabbagey. Watch the timing so they stay tender without turning mushy.

Swap the brussels sprouts

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Brussels sproutsthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, 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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