Name: Welsh Rarebit
Ingredients: 4 slices of toasted bread; 1 cup grated old cheese; ½ cup salted water

Why it works: Bread and cheese are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,130 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Welsh Rarebit

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

4 slices of toasted bread
1 cup grated old cheese
½ cup salted water

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

Arrange the toasted bread on a platter.
Pour salted water over the bread to soften it.
Grate cheese to cover the softened toast.

Melt and serve

Set the platter in a 400°F (200°C) oven to melt the cheese.
Once melted, serve the cheese on the toast as sandwiches.

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.

Bread + cheesetop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,130 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Old cheese: Melts into a rich, savory topping that browns and sets on the toast.
Toasted bread: Provides a sturdy base that holds the melted cheese.
Salted water: Moistens the bread so it softens slightly under the cheese.

“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.