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Broiled Ham Anp EaGs

A dish of broiled ham topped with poached eggs, seasoned with pepper and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Ham and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,526 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Broiled Ham Anp EaGs

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Broil the ham until heated through.

  2. Poach the eggs until the whites are set and the yolks are still runny.

  3. Trim the poached eggs neatly.

  4. Serve the broiled ham with the poached eggs on top, seasoned with pepper and salt.

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. Ham + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,526 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Ham + peppertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Egg + peppertop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together50,580 recipes

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

Egg and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 50,580 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Ham
Provides the savoury, meaty base that the eggs are served on.
Eggs
Set whites give structure, while runny yolks add richness and a silky sauce-like coating.

The step that matters

Poach the eggs until the whites are set and the yolks are still runny. Egg white proteins set at around 60 to 70 degrees Celsius, while yolk proteins set at higher temperatures. Stopping early keeps the yolk runny; cooking too long or too hot turns the yolk firm and makes the whites rubbery.

“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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