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Cheese Sandwiches, Hot

A toasted sandwich with melted cheese, buttered bread, and seasoning of salt and cayenne.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cheese Sandwiches, Hot

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Lightly butter thin slices of bread.

  2. Sprinkle generously with cheese and press two slices together.

  3. Cut in half and toast quickly.

  4. Serve immediately with coffee.

Alternative method

  1. Alternatively, toast circular pieces of bread.

  2. Sprinkle with a thick layer of grated cheese seasoned with salt and cayenne.

  3. Place in a shallow pan and bake until the cheese is melted.

  4. Serve immediately.

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 + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Cheese + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,130 recipes

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

  3. Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

  4. Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

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

  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

American cheese or cream cheese
Melts into a gooey filling that binds the sandwich together.
Butter
Adds fat that browns the bread surface and gives a rich flavor.
Bread
Provides the structure that holds the melted cheese.

The step that matters

Toast quickly over moderate heat. Cheese melts before the bread browns if heat is too high, while too low a heat dries the bread and lets the cheese stay stiff. Quick, even toasting browns the buttered surface while the filling softens.

“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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