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Fried Onions Avith Parmezan Cheese

Fried onion rings coated in a parmesan‑flavored batter and served with a mustard‑butter sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,259 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Fried Onions Avith Parmezan Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the batter

  1. Peel and slice the onions into ½‑inch thick rounds.

  2. In a bowl, mix flour, cream, pepper, salt, and eggs, then beat for 10 minutes.

  3. Add grated Parmesan cheese to the batter and mix well.

Fry and serve

  1. Dip each onion slice into the batter using a fork.

  2. Fry the battered onion slices in boiling lard until golden brown.

  3. Drain the fried onions and arrange them on a serving plate.

  4. Serve with melted butter mixed with a little mustard in a sauce boat.

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. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  3. Parmesan cheese + buttertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,163 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the batter and help it set into a coating around the onion.
All-purpose flour
Forms the base of the batter and gives the coating its structure.
Parmesan cheese
Adds savoury flavour and helps the coating brown as it fries.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture to the batter, keeping the coating tender.

The step that matters

Frying the battered onion slices in boiling lard until golden brown. The lard must be hot enough to set the batter quickly; if it is too cool, the coating absorbs fat and turns greasy, and the onion steams instead of crisping.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, flour, cream, pepper, egg, parmesan cheese, butter):

  1. Spinachfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, flour, cream, pepper, egg, parmesan cheese, butter. 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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