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Cauliflower Au Qratin

A baked cauliflower dish topped with a cheese sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Cauliflower Au Qratin

Oven, in the book's wordsA very hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a very hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the cauliflower

  1. Boil cauliflower in salted water until tender. Drain cauliflower and cut it coarsely.

Make the cheese sauce

  1. Mix butter and flour together, then stir in hot milk until thick and smooth.

  2. Add salt and pepper, then stir in grated Parmesan cheese.

Assemble and bake

  1. Pour cheese sauce over cauliflower and sprinkle additional cheese on top.

  2. Brown in oven at 400°F (200°C).

  3. Serve hot.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Butter + parmesan cheesetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,163 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Cauliflower + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,113 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Cauliflower + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together569 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Cauliflower
Forms the bulk of the dish and softens when boiled until tender.
Butter
Combines with flour to form a roux that begins to thicken the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth sauce when cooked with butter.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the sauce that thickens as it heats.
Parmesan cheese
Adds savory flavor and helps the top brown in the oven.

The step that matters

Stirring the hot milk into the butter and flour. Adding the hot milk gradually while stirring keeps the flour from clumping. Smooth, even stirring lets the starch thicken the sauce evenly.

Swap the cauliflower

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, milk, pepper, parmesan cheese):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Cauliflowerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, milk, pepper, parmesan cheese. 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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