Name: Salsify, or Oyster Plant
Ingredients: Salsify (Oyster Plant); Water; Vinegar; Coarse sea salt; White sauce

Why it works: Oyster and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,233 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Salsify, or Oyster Plant

Ingredients

Directions

Scrape the salsify and place it immediately in cold water mixed with a little vinegar to prevent discoloration.
Cook the salsify in boiling salted water for one hour or until tender.
Drain the salsify, cut it into inch-long pieces, and mix it with a white sauce.

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.

Oyster + saucetop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,233 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Vinegar + saucetop 26% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,844 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Oyster + vinegartop 29% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,024 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).