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Dropped Eggs with Ham

Poached eggs served on buttered toast with grated ham sprinkled on top.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and ham are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,475 recipes. Both carry trans-2-decenal, which smells waxy, orange. The science ↓

Dropped Eggs with Ham

Ingredients

Directions

Poach the eggs

  1. Heat a small pan of water until hot.

  2. Carefully drop the eggs into the water without breaking the yolks.

  3. Using a spoon, dip hot water onto the yolks until a white skin forms.

  4. Gently remove the eggs one at a time with an egg slice.

Serve

  1. Place the eggs on buttered toast.

  2. Lightly rub the eggs with a little butter.

  3. Sprinkle grated ham over the eggs and serve immediately.

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 + hamtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,475 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  2. Egg + hamtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,526 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Egg white proteins set around the yolk, giving the poached egg its shape and body.
Butter
Adds richness and fat to the toast and a soft sheen to the eggs.

The step that matters

Spooning hot water over the yolks. Spooning hot water over the yolks helps a thin layer of egg white set over them, holding the yolk in place. Without this skin, the yolk can spread or break when the egg is lifted out.

“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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