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Curried Mixed Vegetables

A mixed vegetable dish flavored with curry powder, butter, and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Cauliflower and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 286 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Curried Mixed Vegetables

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Boil the vegetables (except peas) until tender.

  2. Cut the boiled vegetables into neat pieces.

Cook the curry

  1. In a frying pan, melt the butter over medium heat.

  2. Add the sliced onion and fry until slightly brown.

  3. Knead the curry powder and salt into the butter and onion mixture.

  4. Stir in the boiled vegetables and fry for about 8 minutes, stirring constantly.

  5. Just before serving, stir in the cream for added richness.

  6. Serve immediately.

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. Cauliflower + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together286 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Beans + tomatotop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,713 recipes

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

  4. Beans + cauliflowertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together290 recipes

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

  5. Beans + turniptop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together400 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Carries the curry spices and browns the onion, adding richness to the dish.
Onion
Browns in the butter to add sweetness and savory depth to the curry.
Curry powder
Provides the main spiced aroma and flavor of the dish.
Cauliflower
Adds bulk and texture as the main cooked vegetable.
Carrots
Adds bulk, mild sweetness and texture as a main cooked vegetable.
Cream
Stirred in at the end to add richness and a smoother mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Frying the curry powder and salt into the butter and onion. Spices bloom and release more aroma when fried briefly in fat, while long or high heat can scorch them and turn them bitter.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (peas, beans, cauliflower, carrot, turnip, tomato, butter):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Lettucefits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against peas, beans, cauliflower, carrot, turnip, tomato, butter. 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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