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Soft Boiled Eggs No. 1

Soft boiled eggs cooked in hot water and served with salt, pepper, butter, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,814 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Soft Boiled Eggs No. 1

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Place the eggs in a saucepan and cover with boiling water.

  2. Remove to the back of the stove where the water stays very hot but does not boil.

  3. Let the eggs sit in the hot water for 5 minutes, keeping them covered.

  4. Break the eggs into warm egg cups.

  5. Season with salt, pepper, butter, and a few drops of vinegar.

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. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Butter + vinegartop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,513 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  5. Egg + vinegartop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,922 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Egg and vinegar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,922 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

Eggs
Set the proteins gently in the hot water, giving a soft, runny centre.
Butter
Adds fat and richness to the soft yolk.
Vinegar
Adds a bright acidity that lifts the rich yolk.

The step that matters

Keep the water hot but not boiling. Boiling water cooks the eggs too quickly and can toughen the whites and set the yolks firm. Holding the water just below a boil, with the pan covered, cooks the eggs gently and evenly until the whites are set and the yolks stay soft.

“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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