Name: Bouillon De Veau Pour Les Malades
Ingredients: 1 pound of veal (500 grams); 6 cups of water (1.5 liters); a few lettuce leaves; a pinch of chervil; a little salt

Why it works: Lettuce and chervil match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 396 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Bouillon De Veau Pour Les Malades

Ingredients

Directions

Boil the veal in the water.
Add the lettuce leaves and chervil.
Season lightly with salt.

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.

Lettuce + cherviltop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together396 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Veal + lettucetop 27% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together383 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).
Veal + cherviltop 29% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together131 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal: Provides the main meaty flavour and body that gives the broth its substance.
Lettuce leaves: Add a mild, fresh vegetal note that lightly flavours the broth.