Name: Anchovy and Egg Sandwiches
Ingredients: 10 anchovies; 3 hard-boiled egg yolks; 2 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese; butter; cayenne pepper; white or brown bread; curry butter (made with ½ cup fresh butter, 1 heaped teaspoon curry powder)

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 ↓

Anchovy and Egg Sandwiches

Ingredients

10 anchovies
3 hard-boiled egg yolks
2 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
butter
cayenne pepper
white or brown bread
curry butter (made with ½ cup fresh butter, 1 heaped teaspoon curry powder)

Directions

Prepare the filling

Remove the bones from the anchovies and mash them with the hard-boiled yolks.
Mix in the grated Parmesan cheese and a pinch of cayenne pepper.

Assemble and serve

Spread butter on slices of bread.
Spread the anchovy mixture on one slice and top with another slice.
For curry butter, beat fresh butter with curry powder until creamy.
Serve sandwiches with curry butter on the side.

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.

Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Parmesan cheese + buttertop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,163 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together22,662 recipes

Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
Parmesan cheese + peppertop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,322 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).
Parmesan cheese + breadtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together577 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Anchovies: Provide a salty, savory flavour that forms the main taste of the filling.
Hard-boiled egg yolks: Bind with the anchovies to form a smooth, spreadable filling.
Parmesan cheese: Adds savory depth and salty umami to the filling.
Butter: Adds richness and moisture to the bread and the curry 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.