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Robert Sauce Fob Boast Pobk, Ob Geese, &C

A sauce made with butter, onion, flour, mushroom ketchup, broth or water, pepper, mustard, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,259 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Robert Sauce Fob Boast Pobk, Ob Geese, &C

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Melt the butter in a pint saucepan.

  2. Add the minced onion and cook until light brown.

  3. Stir in the flour and mushroom ketchup.

Finish the sauce

  1. Add the broth or water and pepper, then bring to a boil.

  2. Stir in the mustard and season with salt.

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 + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

  2. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

  4. Onion + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,626 recipes

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

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 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

Butter
Provides fat that carries flavour and gives the sauce a rich mouthfeel.
Onion
Browning softens its sharpness and adds sweet, savoury aroma to the sauce.
Flour
Starch that thickens the liquid into a smooth, cohesive sauce when heated.
Mushroom ketchup
Adds savoury, umami depth and a dark colour to the sauce.
Broth or water
Forms the liquid base that the flour thickens into the sauce.
Mustard
Adds sharpness and pungent aroma that cut through the richness of the fat.

The step that matters

Adding the broth or water. The flour must be fully blended into the butter and onion first, or the liquid will form lumps. Starch thickens the sauce as it heats and reaches a boil, so stirring during this stage keeps it smooth.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, onion, flour, mushroom, 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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