Skip to main content
Main

Onions with Parmesan Cheese

A fried onion dish coated in a Parmesan cheese batter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Onion and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,259 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Onions with Parmesan Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. Peel and slice the onions into ½-inch thick slices.

  2. In a bowl, mix flour, cream, pepper, salt, and eggs.

  3. Beat the mixture for 10 minutes.

  4. Add grated Parmesan cheese to the batter and mix well.

Fry and serve

  1. Dip each onion slice into the batter using a fork.

  2. Fry the battered onions in boiling lard until golden brown.

  3. Drain the fried onions and arrange them on a plate.

  4. Melt butter and mix with mustard, then serve.

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. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 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

Onions
Form the main body of the dish, becoming sweet and tender when fried.
Flour
Provides the structure that holds the batter to the onion slices.
Eggs
Bind the batter and help it set and crisp during frying.
Parmesan cheese
Adds savory, salty flavor and helps the coating brown.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness to the batter, keeping it tender.

The step that matters

Frying the battered onions in boiling lard. The fat must be hot enough to set the batter quickly; if it is too cool, the coating absorbs oil and turns greasy instead of crisp and golden.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, flour, cream, pepper, egg, parmesan cheese, butter):

  1. Spinachfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, flour, cream, pepper, egg, parmesan cheese, butter. 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.

You might also like

Macaroni and CheeseMacaroni and Cheese102 recipesCheese MakingCheese Making50 recipesCheese FrittersCheese Fritters34 recipesCheese OmeletteCheese Omelette31 recipes