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Stewed Cheese

A melted cheese sauce thickened with cream and egg yolks, then browned.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Stewed Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

Make the cheese base

  1. Dissolve the cheese with butter and pepper over steam until melted.

  2. In a saucepan, combine cheese, butter, and cream.

  3. Simmer gently until smooth.

  4. Remove from heat and let cool.

Finish and brown

  1. Stir in beaten egg yolks.

  2. Shape the mixture as desired and brown it under a broiler or with a salamander.

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

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

  2. Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

  3. Cheese + creamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,655 recipes

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

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Cheese + peppertop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,861 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Cheese
Melts into the base to provide the main flavor and body of the stew.
Butter
Adds fat that makes the melted cheese smooth and rich.
Cream
Adds moisture and fat so the mixture stays smooth rather than grainy.
Egg yolks
Thicken the mixture as they set gently and add richness to the texture.

The step that matters

Simmer gently until smooth. High heat can make cheese separate and turn grainy or oily, because the proteins tighten and the fat splits out. Keeping the heat low lets the cheese melt evenly into the cream and butter.

“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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