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Mixed Eggs and Bacon

A scrambled egg dish with bacon and hot pickles for decoration.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 88,785 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Mixed Eggs and Bacon

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Cook the bacon in a pan until crispy.

  2. In a bowl, beat the eggs with milk, salt, and pepper.

  3. Add the egg mixture to the cooked bacon in the pan.

  4. Stir gently until the eggs are firm but still soft.

  5. Turn the mixture out onto a dish and decorate with hot pickles.

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

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

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

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

  3. Egg + peppertop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together50,580 recipes

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

Egg and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 50,580 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set into a soft, tender structure as they cook, forming the body of the scramble.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness, keeping the scrambled eggs tender rather than dry.
Bacon
Adds fat and savory flavor to the pan, which coats the eggs as they cook.

The step that matters

Stir gently until the eggs are firm but still soft. Egg proteins set quickly over heat and tighten into dry, rubbery curds if overcooked. Removing them from the heat while still glossy keeps the texture soft, since residual heat finishes the cooking.

“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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