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Cheese Ramequins

Cheese ramequins are baked cheese custard cups made with flour, water, butter, cheese, eggs, and optional Gruyère topping.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Gruyere cheese and parmesan cheese match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 152 recipes. Both carry ethyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells fruity, apple. The science ↓

Cheese Ramequins

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the paste

  1. Mix flour smoothly with water in a saucepan.

  2. Add salt, pepper, and butter; bring to a boil for 3-4 minutes.

  3. Stir in crumbled Cheshire cheese and boil for another minute.

  4. Gradually add beaten eggs while stirring continuously.

Shape and bake

  1. Drop mixture onto a well-oiled baking tin in lumps the size of small apples.

  2. Press centers slightly, brush with egg, and add small pieces of Gruyère cheese on top.

  3. Bake at 400°F (200°C) for about 12 minutes and serve hot.

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. Gruyere cheese + parmesan cheesetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together152 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  2. Cheese + gruyere cheesetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together93 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  3. Cheese + parmesan cheesetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,041 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  4. Butter + cheesetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Butter + parmesan cheesetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,163 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Forms the starch base that gives the paste body and lets it hold its shape.
Eggs
Set during baking to give the ramequins structure and a light, puffed texture.
Cheshire cheese
Adds rich savory flavor and fat, and melts into the paste for a creamy interior.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, contributing flavor and a tender texture to the paste.

The step that matters

Gradually add beaten eggs while stirring continuously. Adding egg slowly while stirring lets it blend evenly into the hot paste; dumping it in at once can scramble the egg and leave the mixture lumpy and uneven.

“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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