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Preserve

Pounded Cheese

Pounded cheese is a cheese spread made by pounding cheese with butter and optional spices, then stored in clarified butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cheese and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,962 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Pounded Cheese

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the cheese into small pieces.

  2. Pound the cheese smoothly in a mortar, adding the butter.

Store

  1. Press the mixture into a jar and cover with clarified butter.

  2. Store in a cool place for several days.

  3. For extra flavor, add mixed mustard, cayenne, pounded mace, or curry powder.

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. Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

  2. Cheese + mustardtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,805 recipes

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

  3. Butter + macetop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together11,405 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  4. Butter + mustardtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,003 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Mustard + macetop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,534 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

Butter and mace barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 11,405 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Cheese
Forms the main body of the spread and carries its savory flavor.
Fresh butter
Blends into the cheese to make it smooth and spreadable, adding richness.

The step that matters

Pound the cheese smoothly in a mortar, adding the butter. Cheese that is not broken down finely stays lumpy and grainy. Working the butter in gradually helps the mixture emulsify into an even, smooth paste.

Swap the mustard

The recipe marks mustard as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cheese, butter, mace):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Onionfits better
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, butter, mace. 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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