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Welsh Rabbit

Cheese and egg custard poured over warm toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cheese and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,130 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Welsh Rabbit

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Toast the bread slices and keep them warm in the oven.

Make the cheese sauce

  1. In a granite saucepan, bring the cream or milk to a boil.

  2. Add the grated cheese and stir constantly until melted.

  3. Stir in the beaten egg yolks, cayenne, and salt to taste.

Serve

  1. Pour the cheese mixture over the warm toast 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.

  1. Cheese + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,130 recipes

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

  2. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

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

  3. Cheese + creamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,655 recipes

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

  4. Egg + creamtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Cream + breadtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,789 recipes

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

Egg and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Cheese
Melts into the sauce and gives the rabbit its rich, savoury flavour and body.
Egg yolks
Thicken the cheese mixture into a smooth, creamy sauce as they set gently with heat.
Cream or rich milk
Adds moisture and fat so the cheese melts smoothly into a pourable sauce.
Bread
Provides a crisp, sturdy base that holds the sauce when toasted.

The step that matters

Stir in the egg yolks off the boil. Egg yolks thicken by gentle heat; if the mixture is too hot they can scramble and turn grainy. Keeping the heat low and stirring constantly keeps the sauce smooth.

“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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