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Cheese, Eggs and Tomatoes

A scrambled egg mixture with cheese, tomatoes, and seasonings served on hot toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Cheese and butter 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, Eggs and Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Beat the eggs in a bowl.

  2. Mix in the cheese, salt, cayenne, mustard, lemon juice, sugar, and tomatoes.

Cook and serve

  1. Melt the butter in a pan over medium heat.

  2. Stir the egg mixture into the melted butter and heat until very hot, but not boiling.

  3. Serve the mixture on slices of hot 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. Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

  2. Tomato + lemontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,592 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Cheese + mustardtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,805 recipes

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

  4. Mustard + lemontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,816 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Tomato + mustardtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,482 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 heated, thickening the mixture into a soft, spreadable topping.
Cheese
Melts into the eggs, adding richness and savoury flavour.
Tomatoes
Add moisture and a fresh, slightly acidic flavour to the mixture.
Butter
Adds fat for flavour and helps keep the egg mixture from sticking to the pan.

The step that matters

Stir the egg mixture into the melted butter and heat until very hot, but not boiling. Eggs thicken as their proteins set with heat. Overheating or boiling makes them curdle and turn grainy and watery, so stop heating once the mixture is hot and thick.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, cheese, mustard, lemon, sugar, butter):

  1. Asparagusfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, cheese, mustard, lemon, sugar, butter. 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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