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Cheese Scallops

Cheese scallops are cheese discs topped with an egg, baked and served on toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Cheese Scallops

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

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

Assemble

  1. Butter a patty pan and line it with thinly sliced cheese.

  2. Break an egg in the center of the cheese.

  3. Season with pepper and add 1 tablespoon of milk or cream.

  4. Cover with grated cheese.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake for 20 minutes.

  2. Serve on dry or fried toast.

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 + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

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

  3. Cheese + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,426 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Cheese + peppertop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,861 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set when baked, binding the custard-like center into a soft, sliceable base.
Thinly sliced cheese
Forms a melted, savory layer that holds the egg in place.
Grated cheese
Melts and browns on top, adding richness and a golden surface.
Milk or cream
Adds moisture and softness to the egg, keeping the center tender.

The step that matters

Add the egg in the center of the cheese. Keeping the egg centered in the cheese lining helps it set in a neat, contained shape. Eggs cook quickly in the oven, so the whites and yolk set in the same time frame as the cheese.

“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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