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Glazed Carrots

A dish of sliced carrots simmered in stock, sweetened and reduced to a glaze.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,555 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Glazed Carrots

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Slice the carrots.

  2. Boil the sliced carrots for 10 minutes.

  3. Drain the water and cover the carrots with strong stock.

Make the glaze

  1. Add salt, pepper, sugar, and meat extract to the stock.

  2. Cook until the stock reduces to a glaze, shaking the pan occasionally to coat the carrots.

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. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  2. Carrot + meattop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,905 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + meattop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,777 recipes

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

  4. Carrot + sugartop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,211 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Pepper + sugartop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,401 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Pepper and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,401 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

Carrots
Main vegetable that provides the bulk and natural sweetness of the dish.
Strong stock
Liquid that reduces into the glaze and carries the savoury flavour onto the carrots.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the reduced liquid brown and thicken into a glaze.
Meat extract
Concentrates savoury, umami depth into the stock as it reduces.

The step that matters

Reducing the stock to a glaze. As water evaporates, the sugars and meat extract concentrate and begin to brown and thicken. If the pan is left too long, the glaze can scorch and turn bitter, so shaking the pan helps coat the carrots evenly.

Swap the carrot

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Carrotthe original
  4. Potatofits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, sugar, meat. 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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