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Dessert

Fondus with Parmesan

A baked cheese custard made with butter, potato flour, cream, Parmesan, Gruyère, eggs, and a touch of pepper and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Parmesan cheese and gruyere 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 ↓

Fondus with Parmesan

Oven, in the book's wordsA brisk oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a brisk oven”. The 350°F in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the base

  1. Melt butter in a saucepan and mix in potato flour.

  2. Gradually add the nearly boiling cream, stirring to avoid lumps.

  3. Stir in the grated Parmesan, Gruyère, white pepper, and sugar until thickened.

Make the mixture and bake

  1. Whip the egg whites until firm, then gently fold in the yolks and whipped cream.

  2. Combine the egg mixture with the cheese mixture and fill baking cases.

  3. Bake in a moderate oven (350°F / 175°C) until 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. Parmesan cheese + gruyere cheesetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together152 recipes

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

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (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. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Whipped to foam, they give the fondue lightness and a airy, risen structure.
Egg yolks
Their proteins set when baked, giving the fondue a rich, custard-like structure.
Parmesan cheese
Adds savoury, salty flavour and fat, and helps the mixture brown lightly.
Gruyère cheese
Melts smoothly and adds nutty flavour and a creamy, stretchy texture.
Potato flour
Thickens the butter and cream into a smooth sauce base that holds the cheese.

The step that matters

Fold in the whipped egg whites gently. Egg whites hold air only while whipped. Heavy stirring deflates the foam, so the fondue bakes denser and rises less.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, potato, flour, cream, parmesan cheese, gruyere cheese, sugar):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Cinnamonfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, potato, flour, cream, parmesan cheese, gruyere cheese, sugar. 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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