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Cheese, Toasted, or Welsh Rarebit

A toasted bread sandwich topped with melted cheese, mustard, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and cheese are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,130 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cheese, Toasted, or Welsh Rarebit

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut slices of bread about ½ inch thick.

  2. Toast the bread lightly on both sides.

Make and serve

  1. Place slices of cheese on the toasted bread.

  2. Put the bread in a cheese toaster until the cheese melts.

  3. Spread a little mild mustard and pepper over the cheese.

  4. Serve on very hot plates.

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. Bread + cheesetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,130 recipes

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

  2. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Cheese + mustardtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,805 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Bread + mustardtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,484 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  5. Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Bread
Forms the base that holds the melted cheese and toasts to a crisp, sturdy surface.
Good rich cheese
Melts into a smooth, savoury topping that gives the dish its main flavour and richness.
Made mustard
Adds sharpness that cuts through the richness of the melted cheese.

The step that matters

Put the bread in a cheese toaster until the cheese melts. Cheese turns stringy, oily, or scorched if overheated, so it should be heated just until it melts and bubbles lightly.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, cheese, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Tomatofits better
  3. Mustardthe original
  4. Spinachfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, cheese, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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