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Welsh Rarebit

A cheese and egg mixture served over toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Welsh Rarebit

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cheese

  1. Grate the cheese using a cheese grater.

Make the rarebit

  1. In a chafing dish, combine the butter, cream, and cheese. Heat until melted and smooth.

  2. In a bowl, beat together the eggs, mustard, salt, and cayenne pepper. Add to the melted cheese mixture.

  3. Cook until the mixture thickens, then serve over hot toast.

Store leftovers

  1. Store any leftovers in cream cheese jars for cold sandwiches with saltines.

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. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Mustard + peppertop 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 + creamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,655 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

Cheese
Melts into a smooth sauce and sets into a thick, rich coating when cooked.
Eggs
Thicken the cheese mixture as they cook, giving the sauce body.
Cream
Adds moisture and smoothness so the cheese melts evenly without becoming grainy.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, helping the cheese sauce melt smoothly and taste rich.
Mustard
Adds sharpness that balances the richness of the cheese and eggs.

The step that matters

Cook until the mixture thickens. Heat must be gentle. High heat or long cooking can curdle the eggs and make the cheese grainy or oily, while too little cooking leaves the sauce thin.

Swap the mustard

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, egg, cream, 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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