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Asparagus and Cheese

A baked dish of boiled asparagus topped with layers of cheese and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Cheese and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,962 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Asparagus and Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Boil the tender parts of asparagus in salted water until tender.

  2. In a shallow baking dish, layer grated cheese and butter.

  3. Add a layer of cooked asparagus, then repeat the layers, finishing with cheese and butter on top.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until browned.

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. Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

  2. Asparagus + cheesetop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together219 recipes

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

  3. Asparagus + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,026 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

Tender asparagus
Forms the vegetable layers and provides the main body of the dish.
Grated cheese
Melts and browns on top, adding richness and a savoury crust.
Butter
Adds fat that carries flavour and helps the cheese brown evenly.

The step that matters

Bake until browned. Baking long enough lets the cheese and butter brown and set, creating flavour and texture. Underbaking leaves the top pale and the dish wet, while overbaking can dry the asparagus.

Swap the asparagus

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Onionfits better
  4. Asparagusthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, butter. 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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