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Egg Gems

Egg Gems are baked eggs mixed with ham, breadcrumbs, onions, parsley, butter, milk, and cheese.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 Gems

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Make the ham mixture

  1. In a bowl, mix the chopped ham, bread crumbs, green onions, parsley, and melted butter.

  2. Add enough milk to form a dry paste.

Assemble and bake

  1. Butter gem tins and fill them half full with the mixture.

  2. Drop an egg into each tin and season with salt.

  3. Grate cheese over each egg.

  4. Bake until the eggs are set.

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

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

  3. Bread + cheesetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,130 recipes

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

  4. Ham + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

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

  5. Butter + cheesetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 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

Eggs (in the method)
Set to form the cooked centre of each gem as the mixture bakes.
Bread crumbs
Absorb the melted butter and milk to bind the ham into a dry paste.
Chopped boiled ham
Provides savoury flavour and substance as the main filling.
Melted butter
Adds richness and helps the crumbs brown lightly in the oven.
Cheese
Melts and browns on top, adding savoury flavour and colour.

The step that matters

Bake until the eggs are set. Egg whites set at around 60 to 70°C, and overbaking makes the yolks dry and rubbery. Pull the gems when the whites are firm but the yolks still look soft.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Garlicfits about as well
  2. Thymefits about as well
  3. Celeryfits about as well
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, bread, onion, butter, milk, 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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