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Ladies' Cabbage

A baked cabbage dish with butter, egg, milk, and breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,081 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Ladies' Cabbage

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Boil the cabbage in two waters and let it cool completely.

  2. Cut the cabbage finely and add the butter, pepper, salt, egg, and milk. Mix all ingredients well and transfer to a buttered pie dish.

Bake and serve

  1. Sprinkle fine breadcrumbs on top and bake covered at 350°F (175°C) for 30 minutes.

  2. Remove the cover and brown the top before serving.

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. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

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

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg
Binds the cabbage and milk together so the bake holds its shape when cut.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, keeping the cabbage from drying out in the oven.
Fine breadcrumbs
Form a crust on top that browns when the cover is removed.
Milk
Adds moisture that keeps the mixture soft and creamy as it bakes.

The step that matters

Let the cabbage cool completely before mixing. Adding the egg to hot cabbage can scramble it and thin the mixture unevenly, so the bake may turn out watery or set unevenly.

Swap the cabbage

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, butter, pepper, milk. 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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