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Cheese Toast

Cheese toast is bread topped with a buttered cheese mixture, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Cheese Toast

Why it works: Butter and bread 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 ↓

Cheese Toast

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the topping

  1. In a bowl, mash the butter into the grated cheese.

  2. Season the mixture with cayenne pepper, mustard, and salt.

  3. Beat the egg and mix it into the cheese mixture.

Assemble and bake

  1. Toast slices of bread until golden brown and cut into halves or crescents.

  2. Spread about 1 inch of the mixture on the toast.

  3. Toast under a grill or in a 400°F (200°C) oven until light brown.

  4. Serve hot.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Cheese + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,130 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

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

Grated cheese
Melts into a rich, savoury topping that browns when heated.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, helping the cheese mixture spread and turn smooth.
Egg
Binds the cheese mixture so it holds together on the toast instead of running off.
Made mustard
Adds sharp, tangy flavour that balances the richness of the cheese.

The step that matters

Toasting the topped bread until light brown. Cheese proteins and sugars brown quickly under high heat, so the topping can scorch before the egg sets. Watching closely keeps it golden rather than burnt.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Asparagusfits about as well
  3. Potatofits about as well
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, egg, pepper, butter, bread. 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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