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Stuffed Baked Onions

Baked onions stuffed with a mixture of cold meat, bread crumbs, butter, egg, salt, pepper, and paprika.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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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 ↓

Stuffed Baked Onions

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the onions

  1. Cook the onions in water with a small amount of salt until tender enough to pierce with a fork.

  2. Remove from heat, slice off a thin piece from the top, and scoop out the center.

Stuff and bake

  1. Mix the scooped onion with the cold meat, salt, butter, bread crumbs, pepper, and beaten egg.

  2. Stuff each onion with the mixture and place in a casserole or baking dish.

  3. Sprinkle paprika on top and add a small amount of water to the pan.

  4. Bake at 400°F (200°C) for about 15 minutes.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Bread + meattop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,924 recipes

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

  4. Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Onion + breadtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,676 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Onions
Form the edible shell that holds the filling and softens as it cooks.
Eggs
Bind the filling so it holds together when stuffed and baked.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and add body to the filling, keeping it from becoming runny.
Cold meat
Provides the savory substance of the filling.
Butter
Adds richness and fat to the filling and helps with browning.

The step that matters

Scooping and cooking the onions to the right tenderness. Onions must be tender enough to pierce but still hold their shape. Overcooking makes the shells collapse and leak filling, while undercooking leaves them firm and raw-tasting after baking.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, bread, meat, egg, butter):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, bread, meat, egg, butter. 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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