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Cheese Sandwiches

A sandwich filling of eggs, cheese, mustard, butter, and vinegar spread between biscuits or oat cakes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,067 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Cheese Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. Crack the hard-boiled eggs and place the yolks in a small bowl.

  2. Crumble the yolks and mix in the melted butter until smooth.

  3. Add salt, pepper, mustard, and grated cheese, mixing well after each addition.

  4. Stir in vinegar or cold water to achieve the desired thickness.

Assemble

  1. Spread the mixture between two biscuits or pieces of oat cake.

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. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Cheese + mustardtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,805 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Cheese + vinegartop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together922 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-methylbutanol (malty, whiskey).

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

What each ingredient does

Hard-boiled eggs
Yolks form the creamy, rich body of the filling.
Common cheese
Adds savoury flavour and body that thickens the spread as it blends.
Melted butter
Adds fat for a smooth, spreadable texture and rich mouthfeel.
Vinegar or cold water
Loosens the mixture so its thickness can be adjusted to taste.
Mustard
Adds sharpness that cuts through the richness of the yolks and butter.

The step that matters

Stir in vinegar or cold water. Liquid must be added gradually; too much thins the spread and makes it runny, while too little leaves it stiff. Adjusting in small amounts lets the cook reach the desired thickness.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, cheese, pepper, butter, vinegar):

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Mustardthe original
  3. Asparagusfits less well
  4. Potatofits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, cheese, pepper, butter, vinegar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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