Name: Cauliflower Croutons
Ingredients: bread croutons; cooked cauliflower; cheese sauce

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 ↓

Cauliflower Croutons

Ingredients

bread croutons
cooked cauliflower
cheese sauce

Directions

Fry the bread croutons until golden.
Take one piece of cooked cauliflower for each crouton and place it in the center.
Pour cheese sauce over the cauliflower neatly.
Serve immediately while 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.

Bread + cheesetop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,130 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Bread + cauliflowertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together223 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Cheese + saucetop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,987 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Cauliflower + cheesetop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together171 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Cauliflower + saucetop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together463 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).