Why it works: Bread and butter 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 ↓
Anchovy Toast
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 toast
Make nicely browned toast, two inches wide and four inches long.
Finish and serve
Spread the hot toast with anchovy butter.
Place in a 400°F (200°C) oven for a moment.
Serve immediately.
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.
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Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
-
Bread + anchovytop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,260 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanol (green, fruity).
-
Anchovy + buttertop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,697 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
- Bread
- Provides the base that toasts to a crisp, browned surface and holds the topping.
- Anchovy butter
- Adds salty, savoury flavour and fat that melts into the hot toast.
The step that matters
Browning the toast. Toast needs enough browning to be crisp and flavourful; pale toast turns soft once the hot butter is spread on it, so it should be well browned before topping.
“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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