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Dessert

Cheese Straws

Cheese straws are baked strips of flour, butter, cheese, egg, and salt formed into a paste and cut into 7‑inch strips.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cheese 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 ↓

Cheese Straws

bunches of six
Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the dough

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Mix the flour, butter, and grated cheese until well combined.

  3. Add the egg and salt, then mix in enough cold water to form a paste.

Shape and bake

  1. Roll out the paste and cut it into strips that are 7 inches long and ½ inch wide.

  2. Bake the strips in the preheated oven until golden brown.

Finish and serve

  1. Tie the baked straws in bunches of six with narrow cherry-colored ribbon.

  2. Serve on fancy plates or long glass dishes.

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. Butter + cheesetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Cheese + eggtop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,253 recipes

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

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Flour
Provides the structure that holds the paste together and lets the straws set when baked.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and helps the straws brown in the oven.
Grated cheese
Adds savory flavor and contributes to browning at the surface.
Egg
Binds the dough and adds richness and structure as it sets.

The step that matters

Adding the cold water. Too much water makes the paste sticky and tough, while too little leaves it crumbly and hard to roll. Adding it gradually until the dough just holds together gives straws that are tender yet firm enough to cut cleanly.

“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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