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Cauliflower with Parmasan

A baked cauliflower dish topped with grated Parmesan cheese.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Cauliflower and parmesan cheese work together. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 138 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Cauliflower with Parmasan

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. Parboil the cauliflower and trim it to stand upright in a dish.

Make the sauce

  1. Place the cauliflower in a saucepan with 2 cups of white cullis for 5 minutes.

  2. Transfer the cauliflower to a deep dish and pour the sauce over it.

Bake and serve

  1. Grate Parmesan cheese about ¼ inch thick over the top.

  2. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 5 minutes until the cheese is well browned.

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. Cauliflower + parmesan cheesetop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together138 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Cauliflower
Forms the main body of the dish and becomes tender after parboiling and simmering in sauce.
White cullis
Provides the moist, creamy sauce that coats the cauliflower and keeps it from drying out in the oven.
Parmesan cheese
Melts and browns on top, adding savory flavor and a golden crust.

The step that matters

Baking until the cheese is well browned. Parmesan browns through the Maillard reaction, which needs high dry heat at the surface. Pulling the dish too early leaves the cheese pale and rubbery, while overbaking can scorch it and make the sauce 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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