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Venetian Eggs

A savory dish of melted cheese, tomato juice, and egg yolks cooked with butter, onion, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,923 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Venetian Eggs

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Melt the butter in a chafing dish.

  2. Add the grated onion and cook for 5 minutes.

  3. Stir in the cheese and cook until melted.

  4. Add the heated and strained tomato juice.

Finish and serve

  1. Mix in the beaten egg yolks, salt, pepper, and cayenne.

  2. Cook until the mixture is heated through.

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. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Onion + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Butter + cheesetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

  4. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Cheese + tomatotop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,896 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Thicken the mixture and enrich it as they gently cook, giving a creamy, smooth texture.
Cheese
Melts into the warm base to add richness, body and savoury flavour.
Tomato juice
Provides the liquid base and a tangy, acidic flavour that balances the richness.
Onion
Adds aromatic sweetness and depth of flavour as it cooks in the butter.

The step that matters

Cook the egg yolks gently. Egg yolks thicken through gentle heat. If the mixture gets too hot or boils, the yolks can scramble and turn grainy, so heat only until the mixture is warmed through and slightly thickened.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, cheese, tomato, egg, 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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