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Carrots and Peas (Cook the carrots as usual when)
Cook the carrots as usual; when done, drain; add one can of peas and allow to simmer for ten minutes; add salt, pepper and butter and serve at once.
A two-line side dish that assumes you already have carrots cooking and a can of peas in the cupboard. The only real decisions are quantity and how long the peas sit in the heat.
- QuantityThe original names no amount of carrots. One standard can of peas (15 oz, drained about 10 oz) balances roughly 1 lb of carrots, cut in dice or coins. That serves four as a side.
- Canned peas are already cookedPeas are heat-processed in the can and need warming, not cooking. Ten minutes of simmering turns them grey-green and mealy. Two to three minutes over low heat is enough; a bag of frozen peas needs about the same.
- Drain the can, or don'tThe recipe is silent. Draining gives a cleaner flavour and lets the butter coat the vegetables; adding the packing liquid gives a thin broth you will then have to cook off. Drain.
- "Cook the carrots as usual"Boiled or steamed until just tender, 8 to 12 minutes for half-inch dice depending on age and thickness. They should still hold their shape when the peas go in.
- Butter and seasoningAbout 2 tablespoons of butter for the quantity above, stirred in off the heat so it emulsifies rather than splits. Canned peas often carry added salt, so season after tasting.
Commercially canned vegetables were cheap, reliable and year-round by the 1910s and 1920s, and cookbooks of the era treat a can as a legitimate ingredient rather than a compromise, pairing it with a fresh vegetable to make something that looked like garden produce in February.