Why it works: Butter and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 118,967 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓
To Roast Coffee
Ingredients
Directions
Roast the beans
Pick out the black or imperfect grains from the coffee.
Put the coffee in a pan and stir continuously while roasting.
Roast until it is the color of a ripe chestnut.
About ten minutes before it is done, add the butter.
Once roasted, place the coffee in a box and cover it closely.
Make the coffee
Beat the egg.
Mix it with the ground coffee and just enough cold water to moisten it.
Put the mixture in a coffee pot.
Pour the boiling water over it.
Boil hard for 10 to 15 minutes, stirring frequently until the grounds sink.
Be careful not to let the coffee boil over.
Rinse your coffee pot with boiling water.
Pour in the coffee.
Serve hot.
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.
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Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
-
Coffee + buttertop 23% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,442 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
-
Coffee + eggtop 29% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,239 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Coffee
- Provides the main flavor; roasting develops its color and aroma.
- Butter
- Adds fat that coats the beans, adding richness to the roasted flavor.
- Egg
- Beaten and mixed with the grounds, it helps bind them and clarify the brew.
The step that matters
Boil hard without boiling over. Boiling the grounds with the water extracts flavor, and the egg mixture helps the grounds settle. Boiling over wastes coffee and scorches the pot, so watch closely while stirring.
“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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