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Sauce

Celery Sauce

A creamy sauce made from onion, milk, crackers, and celery extract.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Celery Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Boil the onion in water until tender.

  2. Add salt, pepper, and milk.

  3. Thicken with crushed crackers and boil for 15 minutes.

Strain and finish

  1. Pass the mixture through a sieve using the back of a spoon.

  2. Stir in the celery extract 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 + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  2. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  4. Onion + milktop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  5. Milk + celerytop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,491 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Onion
Softens as it boils, adding mild sweetness and a savory base to the liquid.
Milk
Adds richness and body, making the sauce smoother and creamier.
Crushed crackers
Their starch swells in hot liquid and thickens the sauce.
Celery extract
Provides the main celery flavor and aroma.

The step that matters

Thicken with crushed crackers and boil for 15 minutes. Starch from the crackers only thickens fully once it is heated, and it can clump if added all at once. Boiling for the full time lets the starch swell evenly so the sauce sets to the intended consistency.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, milk, celery. 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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