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Dessert

Egg Timbales

Egg Timbales are baked custard-like dishes made with butter, flour, milk, eggs, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Egg Timbales

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the sauce

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  2. Add the flour and stir until well blended.

  3. Add the milk and cook until the sauce thickens.

Add the eggs

  1. Beat the egg yolks until thick and lemon colored, then add to the sauce along with the seasonings.

  2. Beat the egg whites until stiff and dry, then gently fold into the mixture.

Bake and serve

  1. Turn the mixture into buttered molds, set in a pan of water, and bake at 300°F (150°C) until firm.

  2. Serve with tomato sauce.

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. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  4. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
Egg proteins set during baking, giving the timbales their firm, sliceable structure.
Flour
Starch thickens the milk and butter into a smooth sauce that holds the eggs.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the sauce and keeps the baked custard moist.
Butter
Adds richness and flavour to the sauce and helps the flour blend smoothly.

The step that matters

Bake gently in a water bath until just firm. Egg proteins set and toughen quickly at high heat, so a gentle oven and a pan of water keep the timbales smooth and tender rather than curdled or rubbery.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, milk, egg, pepper, parsley):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, milk, egg, pepper, parsley. 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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