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 ↓
Cheese Roasted, to Come Up After Dinner
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the topping
Mix the grated cheese, egg yolks, butter, grated bread, mustard, salt, and pepper in a bowl until well combined.
Toast some bread and cut it into pieces.
Bake and serve
Spread the cheese mixture thickly on the bread pieces.
Place them in a Dutch oven covered with a dish until heated through.
Remove the dish and let the cheese brown slightly.
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.
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 + breadtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Cheese + breadtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,130 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,962 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
-
Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together15,430 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Cheese + mustardtop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,805 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Grated cheese
- Melts and browns to form the savoury topping.
- Egg yolks
- Add richness and help bind the cheese mixture together.
- Butter
- Adds fat and moisture, helping the topping spread and melt smoothly.
- Grated bread
- Adds body to the mixture and helps soak up the melted fat.
- Mustard
- Adds sharpness that balances the richness of the cheese and butter.
The step that matters
Remove the dish and let the cheese brown slightly. Cheese browns quickly once the cover is off, and the Maillard reaction that gives browning also brings bitter flavours if overdone. Watch closely for a light golden colour.
Swap the mustard
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cheese, egg, butter, bread, pepper):
- Capsicumfits better
- Asparagusfits about as well
- Potatofits about as well
- Mustardthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, egg, butter, bread, pepper. 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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