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Welsh Rarebit

A cheese-based sauce served over toast, made with soft cheese, butter, cream, salt, paprika, and egg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Welsh Rarebit

Ingredients

Directions

Make the rarebit

  1. Run the cheese through a food chopper.

  2. Melt the butter in a blazer, then add the cheese.

  3. Once the cheese is melted, stir in the cream or milk.

  4. Add salt and paprika, then beat in the egg until well mixed.

  5. Stir constantly for 1-2 minutes.

  6. Remove from heat and place the blazer in a pan of hot water.

Serve

  1. Serve the mixture on toast.

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 + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  2. Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

  3. Cheese + walnuttop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together410 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Walnut + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Cheese + creamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,655 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Soft cheese
Melts into a smooth, creamy sauce that forms the body of the rarebit.
Egg
Thickens the sauce as it sets gently, giving it body and a richer texture.
Cream or sweet milk
Adds moisture and loosens the cheese so it melts into a pourable sauce.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, helping the cheese melt smoothly without clumping.

The step that matters

Stir constantly for 1-2 minutes. Egg proteins set when heated, so constant stirring keeps the mixture smooth and prevents scrambling or lumps forming on the bottom of the pan.

Swap the walnut

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

  1. Walnutthe original
  2. Pecansfits about as well
  3. Almondfits about as well
  4. Pistachiofits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, butter, cream, egg. 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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