Skip to main content
Main

Baked Lentil Savoury

A baked dish of lentils, rice, vegetables, and egg, topped with milk and served with fruit.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Lentils and beans match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 135 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Baked Lentil Savoury

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Cook lentils and rice until tender.

Make the savory

  1. In a bowl, mix lentils, rice, grated potato, bread crumbs, chopped onion, and beaten egg.

  2. Melt margarine and stir into the mixture.

  3. Fold in peas and beans.

  4. Transfer to a greased baking dish and pour milk over the top.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake for 30-40 minutes until set and golden.

  2. Serve with fruit on the side.

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. Lentils + beanstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together135 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  3. Rice + beanstop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,017 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Potato + beanstop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together655 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  5. Peas + beanstop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together949 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Lentils
Provide the main body and protein structure of the savory.
Egg
Binds the mixture and helps it set firm when baked.
Potato
Adds moisture and starch that help hold the mixture together.
Milk
Adds moisture and richness and helps the top set and brown.
Margarine
Adds fat for richness and a softer, more tender texture.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and help give the baked mixture a firmer structure.

The step that matters

Baking until set and golden. Egg proteins set as they heat, so underbaking leaves the savory wet and loose, while overbaking dries it out and makes it tough. Watch for a firm centre and a golden top.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lentils, rice, potato, bread, egg, peas, beans):

  1. Asparagusfits better
  2. Spinachfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lentils, rice, potato, bread, egg, peas, beans. 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.

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesPotato CroquettesPotato Croquettes255 recipesGreen PeasGreen Peas229 recipesRice FrittersRice Fritters84 recipes