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Cheese Timbales

A baked cheese custard in small molds, made with butter, flour, cheese, eggs, milk, and stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Cheese Timbales

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Make the cheese mixture

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. In a saucepan, melt the butter, then stir in the flour and white stock to make a sauce.

  3. Add the grated cheese, salt, paprika, and beaten eggs to the sauce, mixing well.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into small timbale molds placed in a baking pan filled with hot water.

  2. Bake until the centers are firm, about 20-25 minutes.

  3. Serve hot with cream or tomato sauce.

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

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

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

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

  3. Butter + cheesetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

  4. Cheese + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,426 recipes

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

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Coagulate when heated, setting the timbale into a firm, sliceable custard.
Flour
Thickens the butter and stock into a sauce that gives the mixture body.
Grated cheese
Adds savory flavor and fat, and firms up slightly as it cooks.
Butter
Adds richness and flavor, and forms the base of the thickened sauce.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture, giving a softer, silkier texture.

The step that matters

Pour into molds set in hot water and bake until the centers are firm. The hot water bath surrounds the molds with gentle, even heat. Egg proteins set gradually this way, so the timbales stay tender and smooth instead of curdling, cracking, or drying out from fierce direct heat.

“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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