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Mushrooms Au Gratin

Mushrooms au gratin is baked mushrooms topped with Parmesan, breadcrumbs, parsley, shallot, butter, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and shallot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,737 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Mushrooms Au Gratin

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Wash and peel the mushrooms.

  2. Place them in a baking dish.

Assemble

  1. Sprinkle lightly with salt, pepper, shallot, parsley, and cheese.

  2. Thickly cover with breadcrumbs and add small pieces of butter.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for about 15 minutes.

  2. Serve in the dish.

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. Parsley + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Mushroom + shallottop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,982 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Mushroom + parmesan cheesetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,199 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (apple, fatty).

  5. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

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

What each ingredient does

Fresh mushrooms
Form the base of the dish and release moisture as they cook, softening in the baking dish.
Parmesan cheese
Melts and browns on top, adding savory flavor and a golden crust.
Breadcrumbs
Form a crisp topping that browns in the oven and helps hold the cheese and butter.
Butter
Adds fat that melts through the breadcrumbs, promoting browning and richness.
Shallot
Adds mild aromatic sharpness that mellows as it cooks under the topping.

Swap the shallot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mushroom, parmesan cheese, parsley, butter, pepper):

  1. Spinachfits about as well
  2. Shallotthe original
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Tomatofits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, parmesan cheese, parsley, butter, pepper. 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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