Why it works: Egg and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Noodle Soup
Ingredients
Directions
Make the dough
In a bowl, combine 1 egg, sifted flour, salt, and cold water.
Mix with your fingers for 10 to 15 minutes until stiff.
Shape the noodles
Roll the dough into a very thin sheet and dust lightly with flour.
Roll the sheet like a jelly roll and let it rest for a few minutes.
Slice the rolled dough into thin strips with a sharp knife.
Shake out the strips loosely and let them dry for 1 to 2 hours.
Cook
Drop the dried noodles into hot beef or any other soup and cook for 15 to 20 minutes.
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.
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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
- Binds the dough and adds richness and structure to the noodles.
- Flour
- Forms gluten, giving the dough the elasticity to be rolled very thin without tearing.
The step that matters
Mixing the dough until stiff. Kneading develops gluten, which gives the dough elasticity. If it is under-mixed, the thin sheet will tear when rolled. Stiff dough also holds its shape when sliced into strips.
“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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