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Dessert

Cheese Tartlets

Small pastry cups filled with a buttery cheese custard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk 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 ↓

Cheese Tartlets

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the pans

  1. Roll out the puff pastry thinly and butter nine or ten small patty pans.

  2. Cut the pastry into circles with a notched cutter and line the pans with it.

Make the cheese mixture

  1. In a small saucepan, melt the butter and flour over low heat.

  2. Add the milk and stir until it boils and thickens, then remove from heat.

  3. Mix in the egg yolks one at a time, stirring thoroughly after each addition.

  4. Add the salt, pepper, cayenne, and cheese, mixing well.

  5. Gently fold in the beaten egg whites.

Bake and serve

  1. Spoon the mixture into the lined pans and bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for about 15 minutes until risen and golden.

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

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

  2. Butter + parmesan cheesetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,163 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Parmesan cheese + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,322 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Egg yolks thicken the sauce and whites, folded in, lighten the mixture so it rises in the oven.
Butter
Melted with flour to form a roux that thickens the milk into a smooth base.
Flour
Forms a roux with the butter, thickening the milk so the filling holds its shape.
Parmesan cheese
Adds savoury flavour and salty richness, and helps the filling brown as it bakes.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the roux thickens into a creamy custard.

The step that matters

Folding in the beaten egg whites. Egg whites hold air that makes the filling rise. Folding gently keeps that air in, while vigorous stirring deflates it and leaves the tartlets flat and dense.

“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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