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Coffee Number Four

A clarified coffee prepared with egg white or crushed eggshells.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Coffee and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 29% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,239 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Coffee Number Four

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the coffee

  1. Pick the coffee.

  2. Wash the coffee.

  3. Toast the coffee to a golden brown.

  4. Grind the coffee as needed.

Brew

  1. Boil the water.

  2. Add the coffee by the spoonful, stirring continuously until it boils.

  3. Add the egg white or crushed eggshells to clarify the coffee.

  4. Boil for ten minutes.

  5. Add a little cold water and let it settle.

Serve

  1. Pour the coffee into a pot or urn for serving.

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. Coffee + eggtop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,239 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Coffee
Supplies the main flavour and aroma, and toasting deepens its roasted notes.
Egg white
Coagulates as it heats, trapping fine grounds so the brewed coffee runs clear.

The step that matters

Add the egg white or crushed eggshells to clarify the coffee.. Egg proteins set when heated and gather the fine grounds into particles that sink. Adding them correctly and then boiling gently lets the grounds settle, leaving a clear brew.

“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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