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Broiled Eggplant

A sliced eggplant coated with pepper, oil, and bread crumbs, then broiled until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Eggplant and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,123 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Broiled Eggplant

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Slice the eggplant and drain it.

  2. Spread the slices on a dish and season with pepper.

Coat and broil

  1. Baste the slices with salad oil.

  2. Sprinkle with dried bread crumbs.

  3. Broil until golden brown.

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. Eggplant + peppertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,123 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Eggplant + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together265 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 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

Eggplant
Forms the main body of the dish, softening into a tender interior under heat.
Salad oil
Carries heat to the surface and helps the crumbs and eggplant brown evenly.
Dried bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden crust on the surface as they toast under the broiler.

The step that matters

Broil until golden brown. Eggplant is mostly water and can turn soggy if cooked too gently. High, direct heat drives off surface moisture so the crumbs toast and the flesh turns tender rather than limp. Watch closely, since the crumbs can scorch quickly under a broiler.

Swap the eggplant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, bread):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Tomatofits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Eggplantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, bread. 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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