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Eggs Au Gratin

Eggs au gratin is a baked dish of hard‑boiled eggs in a creamy sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Hamilton, Margaret · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 29,399 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Eggs Au Gratin

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Make a white sauce with 3 oz. butter, 3 oz. flour, and half a pint of milk.

  2. Let it boil for a quarter of an hour.

  3. Add three tablespoonfuls of thick cream.

  4. Pepper and salt to taste.

Bake and serve

  1. Have ready four hard-boiled eggs, cut up in quarters, put into sauce, then put into a gratin dish and brown in the oven.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

284Calories
15 gProtein
19 gFat
14 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Cream1 tbsp (15ml) heavy51
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Salt1 tsp (6g)0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Hamilton, Margaret. 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. See the original page.

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. Cream + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  4. Cream + peppertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together21,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Cream + eggtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Cream and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 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

Butter (in the method)
Forms the fat base of the roux that thickens the sauce.
Flour (in the method)
Thickens the butter and milk into a smooth white sauce as it cooks.
Milk
Forms the liquid of the white sauce, which thickens as it boils.
Thick cream
Adds richness and a silkier texture to the sauce.
Hard-boiled eggs
Provide the body of the dish, set firm and mild within the sauce.

The step that matters

Browning the gratin in the oven. Browning relies on surface heat, which forms the golden crust through Maillard reactions. Too little heat leaves the top pale and wet, while too long can dry the sauce and toughen the eggs.

“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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