Name: Oatmeal Cookies
Ingredients: 1 egg; 1 cup rolled oats; 1 cup honey; 1 teaspoon salt

Why it works: Oats and honey work together. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 634 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Oatmeal Cookies

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

1 egg
1 cup rolled oats
1 cup honey
1 teaspoon salt

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

Beat the egg until light.
Add the rolled oats, honey, and salt to the egg and mix well.

Bake

Drop spoonfuls of the mixture onto a thoroughly greased baking pan.
Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until golden.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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.

Oats + honeytop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together634 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
Egg + oatstop 24% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,317 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-octenal (fatty, green).
Egg + honeytop 33% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,150 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg: Binds the oats and honey together and helps hold the spoonfuls in shape.
Rolled oats: Provide the bulk and chewy texture of the cookie.
Honey: Adds sweetness and moisture, and helps the cookies brown as they bake.

“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.