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Cauliflower, with Parmesan Cheese

A baked cauliflower dish topped with Parmesan cheese and a thickened sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Arrowroot and lime share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 30 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Cauliflower, with Parmesan Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cauliflower

  1. Boil the cauliflower until tender but not fully cooked.

  2. Trim the stalk so it stands upright.

Make the sauce

  1. Rub together the butter and arrowroot in a saucepan.

  2. Gradually add the water while stirring until melted.

  3. Add the cauliflower and let it stew for a few minutes.

  4. Remove from heat.

  5. Stir in the beaten egg yolk, lime juice, and a little water.

  6. Return to low heat and stir until the sauce thickens.

Assemble and brown

  1. Transfer the cauliflower to a serving dish.

  2. Cover with grated Parmesan.

  3. Pour the sauce around it.

  4. Brown the top with a salamander or under a broiler.

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. Arrowroot + limetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together30 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Cauliflower + limetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together19 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Butter + parmesan cheesetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,163 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Cauliflower + arrowroottop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Cauliflower
Forms the main body of the dish and carries the sauce.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving the sauce a smooth, rounded flavour.
Arrowroot
Thickens the sauce into a glossy, smooth consistency without clouding it.
Egg yolk
Enriches the sauce and helps it set to a creamy texture when gently heated.
Parmesan cheese
Adds savoury, salty flavour and browns on top under heat.

The step that matters

Return to low heat and stir until the sauce thickens. Egg yolk can curdle if the sauce gets too hot. Gentle heat and constant stirring let the yolk thicken the sauce smoothly without scrambling.

Swap the lime

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cauliflower, butter, arrowroot, egg, parmesan cheese):

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Coconutfits about as well
  3. Limethe original
  4. Pumpkinfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against cauliflower, butter, arrowroot, egg, parmesan cheese. 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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