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Bread topped with a sautéed mushroom sauce made with butter, mace, cayenne, and gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and mace are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Modern Cookery

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the bread

  1. Cut a thick slice (about 1¼ inches) from the bottom of the loaf of bread.

  2. Fry the bread in good butter until light brown, slightly hollowing the inside first.

  3. Alternatively, butter the bread and grill it over gentle heat until golden.

Make the mushrooms

  1. In a pan, cook the small mushrooms with 3 to 4 ounces of butter, mace, and cayenne for 10 to 15 minutes.

  2. Add the flour and cook for an additional 3 to 5 minutes.

  3. Stir in the gravy or broth and cook for 2 minutes.

  4. Season with salt and lemon juice, and serve over the prepared bread.

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. Nutmeg + macetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

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

What each ingredient does

Mushrooms
Provide the main filling and their savoury, earthy flavour as they cook in butter.
Butter
Fats the bread for browning and carries the flavour of the mushrooms.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid into a sauce once the gravy or broth is added.
Gravy or broth
Forms the liquid base of the sauce that coats the mushrooms.
Bread
Serves as the base that soaks up the sauce and browns in butter.

The step that matters

Cook the flour into the butter before adding the liquid. Cooking flour in fat for a few minutes removes its raw taste and lets it thicken the liquid smoothly; adding gravy too soon can leave lumps and a floury flavour.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, butter, lemon, milk, nutmeg, mushroom, ketchup):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Cinnamonfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, butter, lemon, milk, nutmeg, mushroom, ketchup. 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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