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Cheese Sandwiches

A sandwich made by spreading a mixture of egg yolk, cheese, butter, and seasonings between biscuits or oatcakes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,067 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Cheese Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. Remove the yolk from the hard-boiled egg and place it in a small bowl.

  2. Crumble the yolk and mix in the melted butter until smooth.

  3. Add the coarse sea salt, black pepper, mustard, and grated cheese, mixing well after each addition.

  4. Stir in the vinegar or cold water to achieve the desired thickness.

Assemble

  1. Spread the mixture between two biscuits or pieces of oatcake.

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. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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

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

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

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

  5. Cheese + vinegartop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together922 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-methylbutanol (malty, whiskey).

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

What each ingredient does

Hard-boiled egg
Yolk gives the filling its body and a rich, creamy texture.
Common cheese
Adds savoury flavour and body, helping the filling hold together when spread.
Melted butter
Adds fat, making the yolk mixture smooth and rich in mouthfeel.
Mustard
Adds sharp, pungent flavour that cuts through the richness of the cheese and yolk.
Vinegar or cold water
Thins the mixture and adjusts its spreadable thickness.

The step that matters

Stir in the vinegar or cold water. Adding liquid too quickly can make the filling runny, while too little leaves it stiff and hard to spread. Add it gradually, checking the texture as you go.

Swap the mustard

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

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

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