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Leeks with Toasts

Leeks served on buttered toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter 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 ↓

Leeks with Toasts

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the leeks

  1. Split the leeks nearly in half and wash them well.

  2. Tie the leeks like asparagus and place them in a pot of boiling water with salt.

  3. Cook until tender, then drain on a sieve.

Serve on toast

  1. Butter the slices of bread and place the leeks on top.

  2. Serve immediately.

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

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

  2. Leek + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together279 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Leek + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together848 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

What each ingredient does

Leeks
Are the main vegetable; cooking softens them into a tender, mildly sweet filling.
Bread
Provides a sturdy base that holds the leeks above the plate.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that carries flavour and keeps the bread moist.

The step that matters

Cooking the leeks until just tender. Leeks cooked too long turn soft and watery, which makes them fall apart and soak into the bread. Draining them well before serving helps keep the toast from going soggy.

Swap the leek

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, butter):

  1. Leekthe original
  2. Potatofits about as well
  3. Tomatofits about as well
  4. Shallotfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, 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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