Name: Cheese Sandwich
Ingredients: 1-2 lb grated cheese; 1 tablespoon butter, creamed; 1 tablespoon hot sauce or ketchup; 2 teaspoons vinegar; 1 tablespoon sugar; Salt to taste; Graham wafers or light bread

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 ↓

Cheese Sandwich

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

In a bowl, mix the grated cheese, creamed butter, hot sauce or ketchup, vinegar, sugar, and salt until well combined.

Assemble

Spread the cheese mixture between graham wafers or on slices of light bread.

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.

Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Cheese + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,130 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,962 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Cheese + vinegartop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together922 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-methylbutanol (malty, whiskey).
Sauce + sugartop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,147 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Grated cheese: Provides the main body, flavor, and richness of the spread.
Butter: Adds fat that makes the cheese mixture softer and smoother to spread.
Vinegar: Adds a sharp acidity that brightens the rich cheese flavor.
Sugar: Adds a small amount of sweetness that balances the vinegar and hot sauce.

“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.