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Stuffed Eggs, a LA St. James

Hard-boiled eggs filled with a mayonnaise, mustard, and chive mixture.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and chive match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 587 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Stuffed Eggs, a LA St. James

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Peel the hard-boiled eggs and cut them in half lengthwise.

  2. Remove the yolks and place them in a bowl.

Make the filling

  1. Mash the yolks with mayonnaise, Dijon mustard, salt, and black pepper until smooth.

  2. Stir in the chopped chives.

Fill and serve

  1. Spoon the yolk mixture back into the egg whites.

  2. Garnish with additional chives if desired.

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. Mustard + chivetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together587 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Pepper + chivetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,885 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Egg + chivetop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,624 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Egg + mustardtop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,210 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Hard-boiled eggs
Provide the whites that hold the filling and the yolks that form its base.
Mayonnaise
Adds moisture and fat, making the mashed yolks smooth and creamy.
Dijon mustard
Adds sharp acidity and flavor that balances the richness of the yolks.

The step that matters

Mash the yolks with mayonnaise, Dijon mustard, salt, and black pepper until smooth. Mashing the yolks thoroughly breaks them into a fine, even paste. Under-mashed yolks leave lumps and dry pockets, while the mayonnaise emulsifies with the yolk fat to create a uniformly creamy filling.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, pepper, chive):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Spinachfits better
  3. Welsh onionfits better
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, pepper, chive. 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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