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Schmidt Test Diet

A diet plan consisting of milk, cocoa, oatmeal, beef, and potato broth served in a structured meal sequence.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 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

Make the cocoa and gruel

  1. If milk does not agree, prepare 16 oz. cocoa using cocoa powder, sugar, water, and milk.

  2. For oatmeal gruel, combine oatmeal, butter, milk, and water; add 1 strained egg.

Cook the beef and broth

  1. Broil 4 oz. chopped beef rare with 0.7 oz. butter, keeping the interior raw.

  2. Prepare potato broth with mashed potatoes, milk, and butter.

Serve through the day

  1. Follow the same meal structure for 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. Cocoa + cocoa powdertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together171 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-ethyl-3,6-dimethylpyrazine (roasted, nutty).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Oatmeal
Its starch swells in liquid, thickening the gruel to a soft, spoonable texture.
Egg
Its proteins set when heated, adding body and binding the gruel.
Chopped beef
Provides protein and fat, and browning on the surface adds savoury flavour.
Mashed potatoes
Their starch thickens the broth and adds body and mild flavour.
Milk
Adds moisture, richness and sweetness, and helps soften the starches in the gruel and broth.
Cocoa powder
Supplies the chocolate flavour and dark colour of the cocoa.

The step that matters

Broiling the beef rare. Heat from the broiler browns the outside quickly while the centre warms slowly, so the interior stays raw. Surface searing reduces surface bacteria, but the inside is not sterilised, so the meat should be handled and cooked with care.

Swap the cocoa

The recipe marks cocoa as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, cocoa powder, sugar, butter, egg, beef, potato):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, cocoa powder, sugar, 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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