Why it works: Butter and egg 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 ↓
Cauliflower a LA Cr&Me
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.
Cook the cauliflower
Boil the cauliflower in hot salted water for about 10-15 minutes until tender.
Tie the cauliflower in a piece of cheesecloth or mosquito net for easy handling.
Place the cooked cauliflower in a deep dish with the blossom side up.
Make the sauce and serve
In a saucepan, heat the drawn butter and beat in the raw egg until well combined.
Pour the butter and egg mixture over the cauliflower before serving.
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.
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Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Cauliflower + buttertop 23% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together823 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
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Cauliflower + eggtop 30% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together259 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-octenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Cauliflower
- Forms the main body of the dish and becomes tender when boiled.
- Drawn butter
- Adds richness and a smooth, fatty mouthfeel to the sauce.
- Raw egg
- Beaten into the warm butter to thicken and bind the sauce.
The step that matters
Beating the raw egg into the warm butter. Egg proteins thicken when gently heated, so the butter should be warm rather than very hot. Overheating can scramble the egg and leave the sauce grainy instead of smooth.
Swap the cauliflower
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, egg):
- Asparagusfits better
- Chivefits better
- Leekfits better
- Cauliflowerthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, egg. 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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