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Toasted Cheese

A toasted bread topped with a melted cheese mixture flavored with butter, egg yolk, cayenne pepper, mustard, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Toasted Cheese

Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Toasted Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the toast

  1. Cut buttered toast into dainty shapes.

Make the cheese mixture

  1. Heat cream in a saucepan and melt cheese slowly in it.

  2. Remove from heat and stir in butter, beaten egg yolk, and cayenne pepper.

  3. Alternatively, melt cheese with pepper and prepared mustard, then spread on hot toast and serve immediately.

Assemble and serve

  1. Spread the cheese mixture on the toast and serve immediately on hot plates.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Cheese + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,130 recipes

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

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  4. Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Grated cheese
Melts into a smooth sauce and provides the main flavor of the topping.
Cream
Keeps the melted cheese smooth and spreadable rather than stringy or grainy.
Egg yolk
Thickens the cheese mixture and adds richness as it is stirred in off the heat.
Butter
Adds fat for a glossy texture and rich flavor to the cheese mixture.

The step that matters

Stir in the egg yolk off the heat. Egg yolk thickens when heated, so if the mixture is too hot it can scramble or curdle. Removing it from heat before stirring in the yolk keeps the sauce smooth and thick.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cheese, butter, cream, egg, pepper, bread):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, butter, cream, egg, pepper, bread. 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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