Name: Cheese Straws
Ingredients: puff pastry trimmings; 2 ounces Parmesan cheese; cayenne pepper; water

Why it works: Parmesan cheese and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,322 recipes. Both carry ethyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells fruity, apple. The science ↓

Cheese Straws

Ingredients

puff pastry trimmings
2 ounces Parmesan cheese
cayenne pepper
water

Directions

Roll out the puff pastry trimmings until thin.
Grate the Parmesan cheese and sprinkle it over the pastry with a little cayenne pepper.
Fold the pastry into a square and roll it out thin again.
Repeat the folding and rolling process a second time.
Cut the rolled pastry into strips about 4 inches long and ⅛ inch wide.
Arrange the strips on a baking sheet and sprinkle with a little water.

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.

Parmesan cheese + peppertop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,322 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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