Why it works: Cream and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Cottage Cheese
Ingredients
Directions
Drain the curd
Pour off the whey from the clabber and place it in a pointed muslin bag to drain for 12 hours.
After draining, mash the curd in a dish until very smooth.
Finish and serve
Add rich cream until the mixture reaches the consistency of thin mush.
Season with coarse sea salt to taste and set aside in a cool place until tea time.
Serve in a glass dish and sprinkle a little pepper on top.
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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Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together85,593 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Cream + peppertop 23% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together21,449 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Cream and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 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
- Clabber
- Its curds form the body of the cottage cheese once the whey is drained away.
- Rich cream
- Adds moisture and richness, loosening the mashed curd to a soft, spreadable texture.
The step that matters
Mashing the curd until very smooth. Curd left in lumps will feel grainy and uneven in the mouth. Mashing it fully before adding cream gives an even texture that the cream can blend into smoothly.
“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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