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Spinach, an Entree

A spinach dish served hot with poached eggs, toast, and browned macaroni.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 118,967 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Spinach, an Entree

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the spinach

  1. Cut each leaf from the stalk and wash the spinach well.

  2. Place the spinach in a saucepan of boiling water, sufficient to cover it, and add a little salt.

  3. Boil quickly until tender, about 30 minutes.

  4. Drain the spinach and rub it through a sieve with a wooden spoon.

  5. Add the butter and mix well.

  6. Place the spinach on a dish and keep hot.

Poach and serve

  1. Break the eggs separately into cups.

  2. Poach the eggs in boiling water.

  3. Carefully place the poached eggs on top of the spinach.

  4. Arrange slices of toast around the spinach, points upwards.

  5. Arrange browned macaroni all around the dish.

  6. 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 + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  2. Spinach + eggtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,323 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Spinach + buttertop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,583 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

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

What each ingredient does

Spinach
Forms the bulk of the dish and provides a soft base for the eggs.
Eggs
Proteins set with heat, giving a tender, firm texture when poached.
Butter
Adds fat that enriches the spinach and gives it a smooth, glossy texture.
Browned macaroni
Browning adds toasted flavour and crisp contrast to the soft spinach.

The step that matters

Poaching the eggs. Egg whites begin to set as soon as they meet hot water, so breaking each egg into its own cup first lets it slide in gently and keep its shape instead of spreading and tearing.

Swap the spinach

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

  1. Asparagusfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Spinachthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, 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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