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Breakfast

Schmidt Test Diet

A daily diet plan consisting of milk or cocoa, oatmeal gruel, and rare beef with potato broth.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Schmidt Test Diet

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In the morning, drink 16 oz. of milk or cocoa prepared with cocoa powder, sugar, water, and milk.

  2. For forenoon, prepare oatmeal gruel with oatmeal, butter, milk, water, and a strained egg.

  3. At noon, broil 4 oz. of chopped beef rare with butter, and serve with potato broth.

  4. Repeat the morning and forenoon meals in the afternoon and evening.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Beef + potatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  3. Milk + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  4. Milk + cocoatop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together643 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  5. Cocoa + potatotop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together37 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg
Sets when heated, helping bind the gruel and give it body.
Oatmeal
Thickens the gruel and gives it a soft, porridge-like body.
Chopped beef
Its proteins firm and brown under the broiler, giving a savory crust.
Potato
Its starch thickens the broth and adds body.
Butter
Adds fat for richness, mouthfeel, and flavor.
Milk
Adds moisture and creaminess to both the drink and the gruel.

The step that matters

Broil the beef rare. Meat proteins tighten and lose juiciness as they heat, so a brief, high heat keeps the beef tender. Overcooking makes it dry and tough.

Swap the cocoa

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, butter, egg, beef, potato):

  1. Peanutfits better
  2. Peasfits about as well
  3. Beansfits about as well
  4. Cocoathe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, butter, egg, beef, potato. 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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