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Stewed Lentils

A hearty stew of lentils, onions, carrots, turnips, parsley, and seasonings simmered in water or stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Lentils and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 109 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Stewed Lentils

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and cook the lentils

  1. Prepare the lentils as for soup.

  2. Put the lentils into a stewpan with the water and dripping.

  3. Simmer for 1½ hours or until soft.

  4. Cook the onions with the lentils for 30 minutes to 1 hour, depending on their size.

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Cut the carrots and turnips into strips 2 inches long and ½ inch thick.

  2. Cook the carrots and turnips separately in boiling water with salt.

Finish and serve

  1. Remove the onions.

  2. Place the onions in the center of a dish.

  3. Stir the parsley and seasoning into the stew.

  4. Let the stew boil for a few minutes.

  5. Add the vinegar.

  6. Pour the stew around the onion.

  7. Pile the carrots and turnips on top.

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. Lentils + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together109 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Turnip + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,842 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

Lentils
Form the body of the stew and thicken it as they break down while simmering.
Onions
Cook whole until tender, becoming a mild, sweet centerpiece for the dish.
Carrots
Add natural sweetness and a firm texture that holds its shape in the stew.
Turnips
Add a mild, slightly peppery flavor and a firm texture to the dish.
Dripping
Adds fat for richer flavor and a smoother mouthfeel in the stew.

The step that matters

Cook the onions for the full time. Whole onions need 30 minutes to 1 hour depending on size. Undercooked centers stay firm and sharp, while overcooking makes them fall apart before serving.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lentils, carrot, turnip, parsley, vinegar, pepper):

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Kalefits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lentils, carrot, turnip, parsley, vinegar, 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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