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Cauliflower with Cheese

A baked cauliflower dish topped with melted butter, grated Gruyère and Parmesan, and toasted breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Gruyere cheese and parmesan cheese match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 152 recipes. Both carry ethyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells fruity, apple. The science ↓

Cauliflower with Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Boil the cauliflower in salted water until tender.

  2. Melt butter in a heatproof dish.

  3. Grate the Gruyère and Parmesan cheese.

  4. Once the cauliflower is tender, strain it and place it in the buttered dish.

Bake and serve

  1. Cover the cauliflower with melted butter and sprinkle with cheese.

  2. Top with bread crumbs and moisten with more butter.

  3. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until slightly brown.

  4. Serve in the baking dish.

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. Gruyere cheese + parmesan cheesetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together152 recipes

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

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Butter + gruyere cheesetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together323 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).

  5. Parmesan cheese + breadtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together577 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Cauliflower
Forms the main body of the dish and becomes tender when boiled.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, and helps the top brown in the oven.
Gruyere cheese
Melts into the topping and adds savory, nutty flavor.
Parmesan cheese
Browns on the surface and adds a sharp, savory flavor.
Bread crumbs
Forms a crisp, golden crust on top of the dish.

The step that matters

Bake until slightly brown. Baking only until lightly browned keeps the cauliflower tender and the cheese from turning dry or bitter, while the crumbs crisp and the cheese melts.

Swap the cauliflower

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

  1. Tomatofits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Cauliflowerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, gruyere cheese, parmesan cheese, bread. 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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