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Sausage Stew

A hearty stew of pork sausage, potatoes, and onions simmered in water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Sausage Stew

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a stew pan, layer half of the sliced potatoes.

  2. Add a layer of the shredded onion and half of the sausage, sliced thin.

  3. Season with salt, pepper, and sprinkle with half of the flour.

  4. Repeat the layers with the remaining potatoes, onion, sausage, salt, pepper, and flour.

  5. Pour in the boiling water, cover the stew pan, and simmer for 45 minutes.

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. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Pork + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  3. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  4. Pork + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,214 recipes

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

  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

Pork sausage
Provides the main meat flavor and fat that seasons the stew as it cooks.
Potatoes
Form the bulk of the stew and thicken the liquid as their starch releases during simmering.
Onion
Adds sweetness and savory depth as it softens in the simmering liquid.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid into a light gravy around the potatoes and sausage.

The step that matters

Pour in the boiling water and simmer covered. Starting with boiling water helps the stew come to temperature quickly, and keeping the lid on traps steam so the potatoes cook through evenly without the liquid reducing too fast.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, potato, pepper, flour):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Spinachfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, potato, pepper, flour. 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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