Skip to main content
Main

Welsh Rarebit

A baked cheese toast topped with grated cheese, mustard, salt, and cayenne.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Cheese and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,805 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Welsh Rarebit

Oven, in the book's wordsThe hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

Make and bake the topping

  1. In a bowl, mix the grated cheese with mustard, salt, and cayenne.

  2. Heap the cheese mixture on slices of buttered toast.

  3. Place the toast in the hot oven for a few moments until the cheese begins to melt.

Serve

  1. Serve immediately.

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Grated cheese
Melts into a rich, creamy topping that browns and sets as it cools.
Mustard
Adds a sharp, tangy flavour that balances the richness of the cheese.
Buttered toast
Provides a crisp, absorbent base that holds the melted cheese topping.

The step that matters

Place the toast in the hot oven for a few moments until the cheese begins to melt.. Cheese turns stringy, oily, or scorched if overheated, so it should be heated just until it softens and begins to melt, then served right away.

“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.

More welsh rarebit recipes

Tomato 3 See all 354 →

You might also like

Macaroni and CheeseMacaroni and Cheese102 recipesCheese MakingCheese Making50 recipesCheese FrittersCheese Fritters34 recipesCheese OmeletteCheese Omelette31 recipes