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Ham Sandwiches

A sandwich made with a butter, mustard, and ham spread between bread slices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread 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 ↓

Ham Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

Make the spread

  1. In a bowl, cream the butter until smooth.

  2. Add mixed mustard, salad oil (or melted butter), pepper, salt, and egg yolk; mix thoroughly.

  3. Stir in enough chopped ham to achieve a spreadable consistency.

Assemble the sandwiches

  1. Spread the mixture between thin slices of bread.

  2. For plain ham sandwiches, trim the crusts from the bread, butter them, and layer with thin slices of cold, boiled ham.

  3. Optionally, spread a little mustard on the ham.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Ham + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

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

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

  4. Mustard + hamtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together747 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  5. Mustard + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,484 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Creams to a smooth base that gives the spread richness and a soft, spreadable texture.
Egg yolk
Emulsifies with the fat and binds the mixture so it holds together on the bread.
Mixed mustard
Adds sharp, tangy flavour that cuts through the richness of the butter and ham.
Chopped ham
Supplies the savoury meat flavour and bulk that gives the spread its body.

The step that matters

Mixing the egg yolk into the butter. Butter and egg yolk must be combined gradually and thoroughly so they emulsify smoothly; if the mixture separates or is under-mixed, the spread turns greasy and uneven.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, mustard, egg, ham, bread):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, mustard, egg, ham, bread. 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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