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Montpellier Sandwiches

A spread made from hard‑boiled egg yolks, butter, anchovy essence or anchovies, and cayenne pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and anchovy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,330 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Montpellier Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

Make the spread

  1. Mix the hard-boiled yolks with butter and anchovy essence or boned anchovies, then add cayenne pepper to taste.

  2. Pass the mixture through a sieve.

Serve

  1. Use as a spread for sandwiches.

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. Egg + anchovytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,330 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  2. Butter + anchovytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,697 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Anchovy + peppertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Hard-boiled egg yolks
Provide the main body and creamy richness of the spread.
Butter
Adds fat that makes the spread smooth and easy to spread.
Anchovies
Add salty, savoury depth that flavours the whole spread.

The step that matters

Pass the mixture through a sieve. Pressing the blended mixture through a sieve breaks up any lumps of yolk and butter, giving the smooth, spreadable texture the spread depends on.

“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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