Why it works: Bread and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,466 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓
Breaded Cauliflower
Ingredients
Directions
Trim the leaves and wash the cauliflower well.
In boiling water, add salt and flour to remove odor and keep the cauliflower white.
Boil the cauliflower in this mixture for 30 minutes.
Drain the cauliflower completely and pass it through a colander.
Soak the bread crumbs in warm milk.
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.
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Bread + milktop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together11,466 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
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Cauliflower + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together569 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Flour + milktop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Cauliflower + breadtop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together223 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Cauliflower + milktop 20% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together314 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Swap the cauliflower
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, bread, milk):
- Arrowrootfits better
- Shallotfits better
- Leekfits better
- Cauliflowerthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against flour, bread, milk. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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