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Mushroom Croutes

Sautéed mushrooms with breadcrumbs, salt, pepper, cayenne, and herring roe served on toasted bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Mushroom and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 12,525 recipes. Both carry trans-2-decenal, which smells waxy, orange. The science ↓

Mushroom Croutes

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the mushrooms

  1. Melt the butter in a pan.

  2. Remove gills from mushrooms, wash, and chop them.

  3. Cook the mushrooms in the melted butter.

  4. Add breadcrumbs, salt, pepper, and cayenne to the mixture.

Assemble and bake

  1. Place the mixture on croûtes (toasted bread).

  2. Cook the roe in a dripping tin in the oven at 350°F (175°C).

  3. Cut the cooked roe into pieces and place one on each croûte.

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. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  2. Mushroom + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,580 recipes

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

  3. Roe + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together442 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  4. Mushroom + roetop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together85 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  5. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Mushrooms
Form the main savoury filling and add earthy flavour and moisture as they cook in butter.
Soft herring roe
Adds a rich, savoury, slightly creamy topping that stands out against the mushrooms.
Breadcrumbs
Absorb the butter and mushroom juices, giving the filling body so it holds on the croûtes.
Butter
Carries the mushrooms' cooking and adds richness and fat for flavour.

The step that matters

Cook the roe in a dripping tin in the oven at 350°F (175°C).. Soft roe is delicate and can overcook quickly, turning dry and grainy. Gentle, moderate oven heat sets it through while keeping it tender and moist.

“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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