Why it works: Cream and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓
Bread Fritters
Ingredients
Directions
Boil the milk and soak the bread crumbs in it for 10 minutes in a covered bowl.
Beat the mixture until smooth.
Add the well-beaten yolks of the eggs, then the salt, nutmeg, baking soda, and cream of tartar dissolved in a little hot water.
Finally, fold in the egg whites beaten to a stiff froth.
Serve with butter and sugar or maple syrup.
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.
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Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together43,450 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
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Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together11,466 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
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Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,920 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
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Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together22,662 recipes
Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
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Bread + nutmegtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,997 recipes
Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Swap the nutmeg
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, bread, cream, sugar, egg):
- Nutmegthe original
- Cinnamonfits about as well
- Gingerfits less well
- Celeryfits less well
Fit is the average pairing score against milk, bread, cream, sugar, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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