Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Delicious Scalloped Cheese
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Soak the dry bread crumbs in sweet milk until soft.
In a bowl, mix the soaked bread crumbs with beaten eggs, grated cheese, and butter.
Season with salt and pepper.
Bake
Transfer the mixture to a baking dish.
Top with buttered, peppered, and salted bread crumbs.
Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 15 minutes.
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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Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Bread + cheesetop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,130 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,962 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Milk + cheesetop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,426 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Dry bread crumbs
- Soaked in milk, they absorb liquid and give the custard a soft, tender body.
- Eggs
- Beaten eggs set when heated, binding the mixture into a sliceable, custard-like structure.
- Grated cheese
- Melts into the custard, adding richness, savory flavor and a silky texture.
- Sweet milk
- Hydrates the bread crumbs and forms the liquid base that becomes custard when baked.
The step that matters
Baking until just set. Eggs set as they heat, so overbaking can make the custard dry, grainy, or curdled. Remove it when the center is barely firm and it will finish setting as it rests.
“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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