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Cauliflowers with Cheese

A baked dish of cauliflower topped with cheese, breadcrumbs, and a white sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Cauliflowers with Cheese

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the cauliflower

  1. Wash cauliflowers.

  2. Boil cauliflowers in salted water.

  3. Drain cauliflowers.

  4. Chop cauliflower.

Make the sauce

  1. Melt butter in a small pan. Mix in flour. Add milk until smooth.

Assemble and bake

  1. Pour some sauce into the bottom of a fireproof dish.

  2. Layer half of cauliflower on sauce.

  3. Sprinkle a layer of grated cheese and a little black pepper on top.

  4. Add remaining cauliflower.

  5. Add another layer of cheese and pepper.

  6. Pour the rest of sauce over the top.

  7. Mix breadcrumbs with a little grated cheese. Spread mixture over the last layer. Smooth the surface with the back of a spoon.

  8. Bake in a 300°F oven for about 15 minutes until a brown crust forms.

  9. Remove excess butter from the edges.

  10. Serve 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.

  1. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Butter + cheesetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Cauliflower + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,113 recipes

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

  4. Milk + cheesetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,426 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Cauliflower + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together569 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Cauliflowers
Forms the bulk of the dish and gives its main body and texture.
Butter
Enriches the sauce and helps the flour cook into a smooth base.
All-purpose flour
Thickens the butter and milk into a smooth, pourable sauce.
Milk
Forms the liquid of the sauce, which sets creamy when baked.
Grated cheese
Melts into the sauce and browns on top for flavour and colour.
Breadcrumbs
Form a topping that crisps and browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Make the sauce smooth before layering. Flour needs to be fully mixed into the melted butter and milk added gradually, otherwise lumps form and the sauce will not coat the cauliflower evenly.

Swap the cauliflower

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, milk, cheese, pepper):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Cauliflowerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, milk, cheese, pepper. 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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