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Creamed Spinach

Creamed spinach is a sautéed spinach dish mixed with butter and cream, seasoned with salt, and served with toasted bread garnish.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Creamed Spinach

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the spinach

  1. Wash the spinach thoroughly and place it in a kettle with no added water.

  2. Cover and cook until very tender.

  3. Drain the spinach.

  4. Chop the spinach very finely.

Make the creamed spinach

  1. In a bowl, mix the chopped spinach with the butter and cream until light and fluffy.

  2. Return the mixture to the saucepan.

  3. Season with salt.

  4. Stir until very hot.

  5. Serve on a hot platter garnished with triangles of thin, dry toast.

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. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Spinach + creamtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,130 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

  3. Spinach + buttertop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,583 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Spinach
Provides the main bulk and vegetable flavor, and releases its own moisture as it cooks.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, helping the chopped spinach become smooth and light.

The step that matters

Draining the spinach. Spinach cooked with no added water still holds a lot of liquid. If it is not drained well, the dish turns watery and the cream and butter cannot bind into a smooth, thick mixture.

Swap the spinach

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Onionfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Spinachthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, cream. 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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