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Dessert

Deviled Biscuits

Deviled biscuits are stale rolls filled with a cheese and egg yolk mixture, then baked until heated.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Biscuit and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 121 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Deviled Biscuits

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Split the stale rolls or biscuits.

  2. Toast them to a light brown in a 400°F (200°C) oven.

Make and bake

  1. In a bowl, mix the grated cheese, salad oil, mustard, salt, cayenne, and beaten egg yolks until smooth.

  2. Spread the mixture on the inside of the toasted biscuits.

  3. Place the biscuits back in the oven to heat through.

  4. Serve covered with a napkin.

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. Biscuit + mustardtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together121 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Cheese + mustardtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,805 recipes

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

  3. Biscuit + cheesetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together252 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  4. Biscuit + eggtop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,643 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  5. Cheese + eggtop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,253 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Bind the cheese mixture into a smooth, spreadable paste and add richness.
Dry cheese
Adds salty, savoury flavour and browns in the oven for a toasted topping.
Salad oil
Adds moisture and fat so the topping spreads smoothly and does not dry out.
Stale rolls or biscuits
Serve as the base; their dry crumb soaks up little moisture and holds the topping.

The step that matters

Toast the biscuits to a light brown before adding the topping. Toasting dries the crumb so it stays crisp under the moist cheese mixture instead of turning soggy. Stopping at light brown keeps the base from over-browning before the topping heats.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (biscuit, cheese, egg):

  1. Mustardthe original
  2. Welsh onionfits about as well
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Spinachfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against biscuit, cheese, egg. 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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