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Cheese Sandwiches

A buttered bread sandwich with pepper, mustard, cayenne, Parmesan, and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Cheese Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

Make the spread

  1. In a bowl, mix butter, pepper, salt, mustard, and cayenne until combined.

  2. Let the mixture cool slightly.

Assemble and serve

  1. Spread the mixture on the bread slices.

  2. Sprinkle grated Parmesan on top before the mixture cools completely.

  3. Press the two slices of bread together.

  4. Let the sandwich cool.

  5. Cut the sandwiches into squares or triangles.

  6. Garnish with fresh parsley.

  7. Serve.

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 + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  3. Mustard + parsleytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,588 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  4. Butter + parmesan cheesetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,163 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 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

Butter
Melts into the spread, carrying flavour and giving a rich, moist texture.
Prepared mustard
Adds sharp, acidic flavour that balances the richness of the butter and cheese.
Parmesan cheese
Adds savoury, salty flavour and a firm, nutty texture when it sits on the warm spread.

The step that matters

Sprinkle the Parmesan before the mixture cools completely. Cheese sprinkled onto warm butter adheres and softens slightly; if the spread has fully cooled, the Parmesan will not stick well to the bread and will fall off when the sandwich is pressed and cut.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, butter, pepper, parmesan cheese, parsley):

  1. Tomatofits better
  2. Spinachfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, butter, pepper, parmesan cheese, parsley. 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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