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Pea Timbales

Pea timbales are small, firm cakes made from mashed peas, eggs, butter, and seasonings, baked in molds and served with sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 68,474 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Pea Timbales

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Drain and rinse the peas, then rub them through a sieve to make pea pulp.

  2. In a bowl, combine 1 cup of pea pulp with the beaten eggs, melted butter, salt, pepper, cayenne, and onion juice if desired.

Bake and serve

  1. Turn the mixture into buttered molds and place them in a pan of hot water.

  2. Cover the molds with buttered paper and bake until firm.

  3. Carefully turn the timbales out onto small saucers and serve with white sauce.

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 + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  2. Peas + oniontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,460 recipes

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

  3. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Peas + peppertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,331 recipes

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

  5. Peas + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,887 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

Peas
Provide the main body and flavor of the timbales once pureed into pulp.
Eggs
Set when baked, giving the timbales their firm, sliceable structure.
Melted butter
Adds richness and a smooth, tender texture to the custard.

The step that matters

Baking in a water bath. Placing the molds in hot water moderates the oven heat so the egg mixture sets gently. Too much heat causes the eggs to overcook, making the timbales rubbery and cracked.

Swap the onion

The recipe marks onion as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (peas, egg, butter, pepper):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against peas, egg, 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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