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French Toast

A dish of bread dipped in egg and milk, fried in butter, served with bacon garnish.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter 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 ↓

French Toast

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Make sandwiches with cheese, sliced chicken, or ham.

  2. Press the slices firmly together.

Make the French toast

  1. Beat the egg slightly and add the milk.

  2. Dip the sandwiches in the egg mixture.

  3. Sauté in butter until golden brown.

Serve

  1. Serve with a garnish of crispy bacon.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

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

  5. Egg + buttertop 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

Bread
Provides the structure that holds the filling and soaks up the egg mixture.
Egg
Binds the coating and sets as it cooks, giving the outside a firm, golden crust.
Milk
Adds moisture that softens the bread and keeps the coating tender inside.
Butter
Adds fat that conducts heat for even browning and a rich, toasty flavor.

The step that matters

Sautéing in butter until golden brown. Butter browns quickly and can burn before the egg coating sets. Moderate heat lets the coating cook through and brown evenly without turning bitter.

“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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