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Potted Cheese

A cheese preserved in butter, stored in a pot for months, served spread on bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Cheese and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,962 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Potted Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Scrape the cheese clean and grate it.

  2. In a mortar, beat the grated cheese with fresh butter until well mixed.

Store

  1. Transfer the mixture into a pot and cover it with a piece of clean bladder.

  2. Store it in a cool place; it will keep for several months.

Serve

  1. Serve spread on bread for breakfast or lunch, with or without seasoning.

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

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

  2. Cheese + mustardtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,805 recipes

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

  3. Butter + mustardtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,003 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. White pepper + mustardtop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together618 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Butter + white peppertop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Rich cheese
Provides the main flavour and body of the spread.
Fresh butter
Adds fat and softness, making the grated cheese spreadable and smooth.

The step that matters

Beating the cheese with butter until well mixed. If the cheese and butter are not thoroughly combined, the spread can turn out crumbly and uneven in texture rather than smooth and spreadable.

Swap the white pepper

The recipe marks white pepper as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cheese, butter, mustard):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, butter, mustard. 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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