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Rice Au Gratin

A baked rice dish with milk, flour, butter, onion, cheese, and breadcrumbs.

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

Rice Au Gratin

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the sauce

  1. Heat the milk in a double boiler.

  2. Blend the flour, butter, salt, and chopped onion together.

  3. Add the mixture to the milk.

  4. Slowly stir in the rice.

  5. Boil for 6 minutes.

Bake and serve

  1. Transfer the mixture to a buttered baking dish.

  2. Sprinkle the grated cheese and bread crumbs over the top.

  3. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until browned.

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

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

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Boiled rice
Forms the bulk of the dish and absorbs the milk sauce as it cooks.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth sauce that holds the rice together.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, giving a creamy, moist texture.
Cheese
Melts into the dish and, with the crumbs, browns on top in the oven.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavour and helping the sauce feel smooth.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden topping when baked over the dish.

The step that matters

Adding the rice to the milk sauce gradually. Stirring the rice in slowly keeps the flour-thickened sauce smooth and evenly coated rather than lumpy. Boiling for the stated time lets the flour fully cook so it does not taste raw.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Tomatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

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