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Savory Onions

Onions simmered in salted water, beef stock, and browned flour, finished with a brown sauce of butter, kitchen bouquet, and tomato ketchup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and beef are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Savory Onions

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the onions

  1. Select young onions and place them in a saucepan with ¼ cup salted water.

  2. Simmer the onions for ten minutes, then drain the water.

  3. Pour 1 cup beef stock over the onions and cook for an additional ten minutes.

  4. Remove the onions to a hot dish using a split spoon.

Make the gravy

  1. In the same pan, thicken the remaining gravy with 1 heaping teaspoon browned flour mixed with 1 heaping teaspoon butter.

  2. Stir until you have a smooth brown sauce, then season with 1 teaspoon kitchen bouquet, 1 teaspoon tomato ketchup, and salt and pepper to taste.

  3. Pour the sauce over the onions.

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. Onion + beeftop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  2. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  3. Beef + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,448 recipes

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

  4. Onion + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

  5. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 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

Young onions
Provide the main vegetable body and sweet flavour that the gravy accompanies.
Browned flour
Thickens the gravy so it coats the onions smoothly.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that carries flavour and gives the sauce a smooth finish.
Beef stock
Forms the liquid base of the gravy and adds savoury meaty flavour.
Kitchen bouquet
Deepens the brown colour of the sauce and adds savoury depth.
Tomato ketchup
Adds a touch of acidity and sweetness to balance the savoury gravy.

The step that matters

Thickening the gravy with browned flour and butter. Flour must be fully mixed into the fat and liquid and stirred until smooth, because lumps form when flour clumps in hot liquid. Stirring keeps starch granules dispersed so the sauce thickens evenly.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, beef, flour, butter, ketchup, 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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