Name: Bread-crumb Omelette
Ingredients: 1 pint bread-crumbs; 1 large handful parsley, chopped fine; 1 large slice onion, minced fine; 1 teaspoon dried marjoram; ½ cup milk; nutmeg, to taste; pepper, to taste; ¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt; 1 piece butter, size of an egg

Why it works: Parsley and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,979 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Bread-crumb Omelette

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).
In a bowl, mix together the bread-crumbs, parsley, onion, marjoram, milk, nutmeg, pepper, salt, and butter.
Transfer the mixture to a baking dish.

Bake and serve

Bake until it turns a light brown color.
Turn out of the dish and serve immediately.

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.

Parsley + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,979 recipes

Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
Marjoram + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together687 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together34,122 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Parsley + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,062 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Marjoram + peppertop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,609 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Bread-crumbs: Form the bulk of the dish and absorb the milk to give it body.
Milk: Adds moisture so the crumbs soften and the mixture stays tender as it bakes.
Butter: Adds fat for richness and helps the surface brown in the oven.
Onion: Adds savory sweetness and aroma as it cooks into the mixture.

The step that matters

Bake until light brown. Baking at a low temperature sets the mixture gradually and browns it lightly. Removing it too early leaves it wet and soft, while baking too long dries it out and darkens it too much.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, parsley, marjoram, milk, nutmeg, pepper, butter):

Carrotfits better
Potatofits better
Shallotfits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, parsley, marjoram, milk, nutmeg, pepper, 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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Bread-crumb Omelette