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White Broth

A clear broth enriched with egg yolk and cream, seasoned with pepper and salt, served with toast cubes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 23% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 21,449 recipes. Both carry acetic acid, which smells sour, vinegar. The science ↓

White Broth

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the broth

  1. Strain the meat from the broth and place it in a saucepan.

  2. Heat the broth until hot but not boiling.

Make the liaison

  1. Beat the egg yolk and add the cream or milk, then strain this mixture into the broth.

  2. Mix well and let the egg set without boiling.

Season and serve

  1. Season delicately with pepper and salt, and serve with tiny dice of 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. Cream + peppertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together21,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  2. Cream + eggtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

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

Cream and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 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

Egg yolk
Thickens the broth as it sets gently, giving a silky, creamy body.
Cream or milk
Adds richness and softens the flavour, helping the yolk blend smoothly into the broth.
Broth
Forms the flavourful liquid base that the yolk thickens into a soup.

The step that matters

Let the egg set without boiling. Egg yolk thickens by gentle heat. If the broth boils, the yolk scrambles into grainy curds instead of forming a smooth, silky liquid.

“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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