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Cauliflower Au Gratin

A dish of boiled cauliflower topped with a grated cheese mixture and butter, then baked until browned.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Cauliflower and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 687 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Cauliflower Au Gratin

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Boil the cauliflower until tender.

  2. In a bowl, mix the grated cheese, flour, mustard, white pepper, and cayenne.

  3. Sprinkle the mixture over the cauliflower and place it flower side up on a flat dish.

  4. Top with the remaining cheese.

  5. Melt the butter and pour it over the cauliflower.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 15 minutes and 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. Cauliflower + mustardtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together687 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Parmesan cheese + buttertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,163 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Cauliflower + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together569 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + mustardtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,066 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

Cauliflower
Forms the main body of the dish and becomes tender when boiled.
Parmesan cheese
Melts and browns on top, adding savory flavor and a golden crust.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that helps the topping brown evenly.
Flour
Thickens the cheese mixture so it clings to the cauliflower rather than running off.
Mustard
Adds sharp, tangy flavor that balances the richness of the cheese and butter.

The step that matters

Bake and serve. Serve immediately, because the cheese topping softens and loses its crisp browning as it sits and cools.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cauliflower, parmesan cheese, butter, flour, mustard):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Turmericfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cauliflower, parmesan cheese, butter, flour, mustard. 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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