Name: Eggs a LA Calcutta
Ingredients: 1½ cups steamed rice; 6 hard cooked eggs; 1 cup thin white sauce; 1 cup Edam cheese, cut in small pieces; Salt, to taste; Cayenne pepper, to taste; Paprika, for sprinkling

Why it works: Rice and egg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and 8,090 recipes mention both. Both carry (e,e)-2,4-decadienal, which smells fatty, deep fried. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Contains: egg, milk (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Assemble

Arrange the steamed rice in a border on a hot serving platter, leaving a nest in the center.
Slice the hard cooked eggs and place them in the nest.
Pour the thin white sauce over the eggs.
Add the Edam cheese pieces to the sauce.

Season and finish

Season the dish with salt and cayenne pepper.
Sprinkle paprika lightly over the top.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

Rice + eggtop 15% of all pairs

Aroma overlapstrong

Mentioned together8,090 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
Rice + cheesetop 6% of all pairs

Aroma overlapstrong

Mentioned together937 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Rice + peppertop 6% of all pairs

Aroma overlapstrong

Mentioned together8,100 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Cheese + peppertop 9% of all pairs

Aroma overlapstrong

Mentioned together7,861 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Sauce + cheesetop 10% of all pairs

Aroma overlaplow

Mentioned together1,985 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Hard cooked eggs: Form the main body of the dish and provide richness and substance.
Thin white sauce: Adds moisture and a creamy coating that binds the dish together.
Edam cheese: Melts into the warm sauce, adding savoury flavour and a soft, stretchy texture.
Steamed rice: Forms the base and border that holds the eggs and sauce.

“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.