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Brocoli and Buttered Eggs

A dish of boiled broccoli topped with buttered eggs and toasted bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Brocoli and Buttered Eggs

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil the broccoli until tender.

  2. Toast a slice of bread to fit the inner part of the dish.

Make the buttered eggs

  1. In a saucepan, melt the butter with salt over low heat.

  2. Beat the eggs and add them to the warm butter, stirring continuously.

  3. Cook until the mixture thickens, then pour it over the hot toast.

Serve

  1. Top with the cooked broccoli.

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

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

  2. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Broccoli + breadtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together80 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity).

  5. Broccoli + buttertop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set and thicken into a creamy, spoonable custard as they cook in the butter.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, silky texture while carrying flavor through the eggs.
Broccoli
Adds a tender, slightly bitter vegetable element that contrasts with the rich eggs.
Bread
Provides a crisp, toasted base that holds the eggs and soaks up their butter.

The step that matters

Stirring the eggs over low heat. Eggs set through gentle, continuous stirring over low heat. Too much heat or too little stirring can scramble or curdle them, so they turn grainy instead of thickening smoothly.

Swap the broccoli

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, butter, 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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