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Egg Plant

Breaded eggplant slices sautéed in fat after steaming.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Egg Plant

Why it works: Egg and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 118,967 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Egg Plant

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Slice the eggplant into ½‑inch thick slices without removing the skin.

  2. Steam the slices until tender.

Bread

  1. Dip each slice in powdered breadcrumbs.

  2. Dip each slice in beaten egg.

  3. Coat each slice again in powdered breadcrumbs.

Sauté

  1. Sauté the slices in lard, butter, or drippings on both sides until tender.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  2. Eggplant + buttertop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together507 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Eggplant + eggtop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together515 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggplant
Forms the tender, moist interior that the breading surrounds.
Powdered breadcrumbs
Form a crisp, golden coating that browns during sautéing.
Egg
Binds the breadcrumbs to the eggplant so the coating holds together.

The step that matters

Double-coating the slices. The egg wash must fully cover each slice, and the second breadcrumb coat must be pressed on firmly. Loose or thin coating can fall off in the hot fat and leave bare, greasy eggplant.

Swap the eggplant

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

  1. Asparagusfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Eggplantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, 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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