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Macaroni a Lttalienne

A simple macaroni dish with milk, butter, and grated cheese.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter 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 ↓

Macaroni a Lttalienne

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and cook the macaroni

  1. Break the macaroni into convenient lengths.

  2. In a two-quart kettle, nearly fill with boiling water; add 1 teaspoon salt and boil rapidly for 25 minutes.

  3. Drain the macaroni and blanch in cold water for 10 minutes.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. In a double boiler, heat the milk and add the butter.

  2. Stir in the macaroni and cheese until thoroughly heated.

  3. Season with salt and pepper, then serve.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Milk + cheesetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,426 recipes

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

  4. Butter + white peppertop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Cheese + white peppertop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together233 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Macaroni
Forms the bulk of the dish and holds the cheese sauce.
Milk
Provides the liquid that turns the melted cheese into a creamy coating.
Cheese
Melts into the warm milk to add richness, flavor and a thick, creamy texture.
Butter
Adds fat that smooths the sauce and gives it a rounder, richer mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Stirring the cheese into the warm milk. Cheese cooked over strong heat can turn grainy, oily or stringy. Keeping the milk gently hot in a double boiler and stirring until the cheese just melts gives a smooth, cohesive sauce.

Swap the white pepper

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. White pepperthe original

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