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Eggs Poached in Consomme

Poached eggs served in a thickened clear beef consommé.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 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 ↓

Eggs Poached in Consomme

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.

Poach the eggs

  1. Heat the consommé or beef soup to boiling.

  2. Poach 2 eggs at a time in the soup.

  3. Place the poached eggs in a heatproof dish.

Finish and bake

  1. Reduce the soup by half on the hot part of the stove.

  2. Sprinkle grated cheese over the eggs.

  3. Place the dish in a 400°F (200°C) oven.

  4. Thicken the soup with browned flour kneaded with butter until smooth.

  5. Pour the thickened soup around the eggs.

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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Beef + cheesetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,193 recipes

    Shared aroma: 12-methyltridecanal (tallowy, beefy).

  4. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Beef + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,847 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set into soft, tender portions as their proteins firm when heated.
Consommé or clear beef soup
Provides the savory liquid base that poaches the eggs and is reduced into the sauce.
Browned flour
Starch thickens the reduced soup into a smooth, lightly nutty sauce.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and helps the flour blend smoothly into the soup.
Grated cheese
Adds savory flavor and helps the top brown in the oven.

The step that matters

Poaching the eggs in the soup. Eggs cook best in liquid held just below a boil, where the whites set gently around the yolk. At a hard boil the whites toughen and tear apart.

“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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