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Egg Plant

Breaded slices of eggplant fried in butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Egg Plant

Why it works: Bread and butter 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 ↓

Egg Plant

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Slice the eggplant into ½ inch thick slices.

  2. Sprinkle with coarse sea salt and let stand for 30 minutes.

  3. Rinse the slices in cold water and pat dry.

Bread and fry

  1. Dip each slice in the beaten egg, then coat with bread or cracker crumbs.

  2. Fry in hot butter until golden brown.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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

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

  2. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Eggplant + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together265 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Eggplant + buttertop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together507 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggplant
Forms the tender, soft interior that contrasts with the crisp crumb coating.
Egg
Binds the bread or cracker crumbs to the eggplant slices so the coating stays on.
Bread or cracker crumbs
Forms a crisp, golden-brown coating when fried.
Butter
Conducts heat for frying and adds browning and rich flavor to the crust.

The step that matters

Pat the slices dry before breading. Surface moisture turns to steam in hot fat and pushes the coating away, so dry slices let the crumbs stick and brown evenly.

Swap the eggplant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, bread, butter):

  1. Asparagusfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Eggplantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, bread, 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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