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Stirred Eggs

Stirred eggs are cooked in butter with gravy or stock, seasoned with salt, pepper, and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Stirred Eggs

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Melt the butter in a skillet over medium heat.

  2. Add the brown gravy or stock and heat until hot.

  3. Stir in the beaten eggs, salt, and pepper.

  4. Add the minced parsley and mix well until the eggs are cooked to your liking.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  3. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Egg + parsleytop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,765 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 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

Eggs
Set into soft, tender curds that form the body of the dish as they cook.
Butter
Adds richness and helps keep the eggs from sticking to the skillet.
Brown gravy or stock
Adds moisture and savoury flavour, keeping the eggs tender rather than dry.

The step that matters

Stir in the beaten eggs over medium heat until cooked to your liking. Egg proteins set quickly and tighten as they heat, so overcooking turns the curds dry and rubbery. Stirring steadily over moderate heat keeps the curds small and soft.

“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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