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Egg Sandwiches— No. 2

A sandwich made with boiled eggs, buttered bread, and seasoned with salt, pepper, and dry mustard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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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 ↓

Egg Sandwiches— No. 2

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the eggs

  1. Boil the eggs for 10 minutes.

  2. Transfer the eggs to cold water.

  3. Peel the eggs.

  4. Slice the eggs.

Assemble and shape

  1. Spread butter on the slices of bread.

  2. Place the egg slices between two slices of bread.

  3. Season with salt, pepper, and a little dry mustard.

  4. Trim the edges.

  5. Cut the sandwiches into desired shapes.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  4. Bread + mustardtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,484 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  5. Bread + peppertop 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

Eggs
Provide the main filling, setting firm when boiled and holding the sandwich together.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and keeps the bread from soaking up moisture from the egg.
Bread
Gives structure and a base that holds the sliced egg filling.
Dry mustard
Adds a sharp, pungent flavour that lifts the mild taste of the egg.

The step that matters

Transfer the eggs to cold water. Plunging boiled eggs into cold water stops the cooking quickly, which prevents a grey-green ring forming around the yolk and makes the shell easier to peel.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, bread, butter, 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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