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Devilled Eggs

Devilled eggs are hard‑boiled eggs filled with a sweet and tangy yolk mixture.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,067 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Devilled Eggs

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the hard boiled eggs in half and remove the yolks.

  2. Mash the yolks with a spoon until fine.

Make the filling

  1. Add sugar, mustard, salt, and butter; mix well.

  2. Add vinegar to form a thick paste.

Fill and serve

  1. Fill the egg whites with the mixture, heaping it up and leaving a rough surface.

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. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Sugar + mustardtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,424 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Provide the rich, creamy base that the filling is built on.
Butter
Adds fat for a smoother, richer texture in the yolk filling.
Mustard
Adds sharp flavor that balances the richness of the yolks.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and balances sweetness.
Sugar
Adds a small amount of sweetness to balance the sharpness of mustard and vinegar.

The step that matters

Mashing the yolks until fine. Yolks mashed until fine blend smoothly with butter and seasoning. Lumps leave a grainy filling, and the vinegar must be added gradually so the mixture forms a thick paste rather than a runny one.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Mustardthe original
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Cucumberfits about as well
  4. Shallotfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, butter, vinegar. 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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