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Vermicelli Eggs

A dish of boiled eggs served with a creamy milk and corn starch sauce, topped with toasted bread and powdered yolks.

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

Vermicelli Eggs

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the eggs

  1. Boil the eggs for 20 minutes.

  2. Once cold, remove the shells.

  3. Chop the egg whites finely.

  4. Rub the yolks through a coarse sieve or potato strainer.

  5. Keep yolks and whites separate.

Prepare the toast

  1. Toast the bread until light brown, ensuring the squares are uniform and crustless.

  2. Place the toasted squares on a serving platter.

  3. Lightly butter the toast.

Make the sauce

  1. Scald the milk.

  2. Thin the corn starch with 2 tablespoons of cold water or milk.

  3. Mix the corn starch into the scalded milk.

  4. Stir until thickened to the consistency of cream.

  5. Add salt to the milk mixture.

  6. Add the chopped egg whites to the milk mixture.

Assemble and serve

  1. Spoon the egg sauce over each slice.

  2. Take small portions of the powdered yolks.

  3. Place the powdered yolks on top of the sauce on each slice, creating little nests.

  4. Serve immediately.

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 + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Corn + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  4. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Yolks are pushed through a sieve for a fine texture, and chopped whites add body to the sauce.
Corn starch
Thickens the scalded milk into a creamy sauce as it heats.
Milk
Forms the base of the sauce, giving it moisture and a creamy richness.
Butter
Adds richness and fat to the toast.
Bread
Provides a crisp, toasted base that holds the sauce and yolks.

The step that matters

Stir the corn starch until thickened. Cornstarch must be thinned in cold liquid before it goes into hot milk, otherwise it clumps. It thickens only as the mixture heats and is stirred, so the sauce reaches a creamy consistency without lumps.

“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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