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Cauliflower a LA Creme

A dish of boiled cauliflower served in a creamy sauce of consommé, vinegar, eggs, and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Cauliflower and vinegar work together. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 888 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Cauliflower a LA Creme

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Boil the cauliflower until tender.

  2. In a saucepan, heat the consommé and vinegar until hot.

  3. Five minutes before serving, whisk in the eggs and cream.

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. Cauliflower + vinegartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together888 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Egg + creamtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  3. Vinegar + creamtop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,064 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  4. Cauliflower + creamtop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together284 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Cauliflower + eggtop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together259 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-octenal (fatty, green).

Egg and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 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

Cauliflower
Main vegetable that softens when boiled until tender, forming the bulk of the dish.
Eggs
Thicken the warm sauce as they set, giving it a silky, custard-like body.
Cream
Adds richness and smoothness, softening the sharpness of the vinegar.
Consommé
Savory liquid base that carries the flavor through the sauce.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and balances the richness.

The step that matters

Whisking the eggs and cream into the hot sauce. Eggs thicken by gently setting as they warm. If the sauce is boiling when they go in, the proteins tighten and scramble, leaving lumps instead of a smooth, creamy sauce.

Swap the cauliflower

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (vinegar, egg, cream):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Cucumberfits better
  3. Mustardfits better
  4. Cauliflowerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, egg, cream. 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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