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Fried Shrimps

Fried shrimps are sautéed in butter, seasoned with pepper, and garnished with lemon slices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Fried Shrimps

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Shell the shrimps.

Cook and serve

  1. In a chafing dish, combine the shrimps and butter.

  2. Heat gently until the butter is melted and the shrimps are thoroughly heated.

  3. Season with pepper.

  4. Garnish with thin slices of lemon before serving.

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. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Shrimp + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,931 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  3. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. Shrimp + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,923 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Shrimps
Provide the main protein, which firms and turns opaque when heated.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, coating the shrimps and carrying flavor as it melts.

The step that matters

Heat gently until the shrimps are thoroughly heated. Shrimp proteins tighten quickly when overheated, becoming rubbery and dry. Gentle heat melts the butter and warms the shrimp evenly, keeping them tender.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Lemonthe original
  2. Mangofits about as well
  3. Limefits about as well
  4. Coconutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against shrimp, butter, 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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