Why it works: Coffee and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 29% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,239 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Boiled Coffee
Ingredients
Directions
Make the mixture
In a bowl, mix the ground coffee with the egg white and ¼ cup of cold water.
Transfer the mixture to a scalded pot and pour in boiling water.
Boil and settle
Boil for 3 minutes.
Remove from heat, add 2 tablespoons of cold water, and let it settle for 10 minutes.
Serve
Pour the coffee from the grounds and serve.
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.
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Coffee + eggtop 29% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,239 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Ground coffee
- Provides the coffee flavor and aroma that the hot water extracts.
- Egg white
- Coagulates during heating and traps fine grounds, clarifying the coffee.
The step that matters
Pour the coffee from the grounds. After settling, the egg white and grounds form a mass at the bottom. Pouring gently keeps this layer undisturbed, so fine grounds do not stir back into the coffee and leave it cloudy and gritty.
“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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