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Crabs' Baked

A baked crab dish with crumbled crackers, eggs, sweet milk, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Crab and pepper work together. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 922 recipes. Both carry nonanal, which smells fat, citrus. The science ↓

Crabs' Baked

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

Make and bake

  1. In a bowl, combine the crabs, crumbled crackers, beaten eggs, sweet milk, salt, black pepper, and cayenne pepper, and mix well until all ingredients are combined.

  2. Pour the mixture into a baking dish.

  3. Bake in the preheated oven until set and golden brown.

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. Crab + peppertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together922 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  2. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  3. Crab + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together467 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  4. Milk + peppertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together26,984 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  5. Crab + milktop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together225 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine (cocoa, roasted).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the mixture and set into a firm, custard-like texture when baked.
Crackers
Absorb liquid and add body, giving the baked mixture structure and a soft crumb.
Sweet milk
Adds moisture and richness, helping the eggs set into a tender custard.
Crabs
Provide the main flavour and protein base of the dish.

The step that matters

Bake until set and golden brown. Eggs set as their proteins coagulate with heat. Underbaking leaves the centre loose and wet, while overbaking makes it dry and rubbery.

“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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