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Sardine Sandwiches

A sandwich made with mashed sardines, hard‑boiled egg yolks, mayonnaise or cream salad dressing, seasoned with salt and pepper, served on buttered bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 22,662 recipes. Both carry (e)-2-octenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Sardine Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Remove skin and bones from sardines and mash them into a paste.

  2. Mix the sardine paste with an equal quantity of hard boiled egg yolks that have been rubbed through a strainer.

Assemble the sandwiches

  1. Season the mixture with salt and pepper, then moisten with mayonnaise or cream salad dressing.

  2. Spread the mixture between thin slices of buttered bread prepared as for Bread and Butter Folds.

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. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

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

  3. Cream + peppertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together21,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Cream + breadtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,789 recipes

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

Cream and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 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

Sardines
Provide the main flavour and the filling's base, mashed into a paste.
Hard boiled eggs
Their yolks, rubbed fine, add richness and a smooth, creamy texture to the filling.
Mayonnaise or cream salad dressing
Adds moisture and fat so the mixture spreads easily and stays soft.
Buttered bread
Thin buttered slices hold the filling and add fat and a soft contrast.

The step that matters

Rubbing the egg yolks through a strainer. Pressing the yolks through a strainer breaks them into fine particles so they blend evenly with the sardine paste. Lumps left in would make the filling uneven and harder to spread.

“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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