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Ckacker Gruel

A simple gruel made by soaking soda crackers in milk, then cooking with butter, pepper, salt, and an egg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Ckacker Gruel

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Crumble the soda cracker into a cup of cold milk and let it stand for 2-3 hours.

Cook and finish

  1. Transfer the mixture to a saucepan with another cup of cold milk.

  2. Add pepper, salt, and butter, then bring to a boil.

  3. Drop in the whole egg, remove from heat, and beat until light.

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. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

  5. Milk + peppertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together26,984 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Soda cracker
Its starch thickens the milk and gives the gruel body as it softens and breaks down.
Cold milk
Forms the liquid base that the cracker soaks into and later thickens with heat.
Whole egg
Adds richness and, when beaten in off the heat, lightens the texture and helps bind the gruel.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smoother mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Drop in the whole egg, remove from heat, and beat until light.. If the egg goes into a boiling liquid without being beaten, it can scramble into lumps. Removing the pan from heat first and beating quickly keeps the egg smooth and evenly blended.

“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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