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Dessert

Bread Cheesecakes

A cheesecake made with bread soaked in cream, eggs, butter, nutmeg, currants, and brandy or white wine, baked in pattypans.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Currant and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,057 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Bread Cheesecakes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the bread

  1. Slice the penny loaf as thin as possible.

  2. Pour the boiling cream over the sliced loaf and let it stand for 2 hours.

Make the filling

  1. Beat the eggs, butter, and grated nutmeg together.

  2. Add the currants and brandy or white wine to the mixture.

Bake

  1. Bake in pattypans or raised crusts.

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. Currant + brandytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  3. Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,920 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  4. Nutmeg + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,311 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  5. Butter + brandytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,127 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Penny loaf
Forms the body of the filling, soaking up the cream to give a soft, custard-like texture.
Boiling cream
Softens the sliced bread and carries richness into the filling.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and set on baking to give it structure.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, contributing to a tender texture.
Currants
Add chewy sweetness and fruity bursts throughout the filling.

The step that matters

Soaking the bread in boiling cream. The slices must soften fully so the mixture bakes evenly. Thin slices absorb the cream quickly, while thicker pieces stay dry in the center and can leave an uneven texture.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, egg, butter, nutmeg, brandy):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, egg, butter, nutmeg, brandy. 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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