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To Bake

A slice of puffball baked with butter, stock, and sherry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and sherry are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,505 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

To Bake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Spread the puffball slice with butter.

  3. Dust with salt and pepper.

  4. Add stock and sherry.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake for 1 hour, basting often.

  2. Cut into 6 fillets.

  3. Cover with the pan liquor and serve.

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 + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,505 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Pepper + sherrytop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,107 recipes

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

  3. 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

Puffball
Forms the main body of the dish, becoming tender and mild as it bakes.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and helps the surface brown during baking.
Stock
Provides moisture and forms the pan liquor that flavors the fillets.
Sherry
Adds acidity and aromatic depth to the cooking liquid.

The step that matters

Basting often during the hour-long bake. Regular basting spoons the stock and butter back over the surface, keeping the puffball moist and encouraging even browning. Letting the surface dry out during the long bake makes the fillets tough and dull in flavor.

“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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