Name: Black Bean Sour
Ingredients: 1 pint black beans; 1 small joint or shank of beef; 1 slice of salt pork; water; red pepper; a little wine; 3 hard-boiled egg yolks, sliced; slices of lemon

Why it works: Beef and pork match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,690 recipes. Both carry 12-methyltridecanal, which smells tallowy, beefy. The science ↓

Black Bean Sour

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beans

Soak the black beans overnight.
Drain the beans and place them in a kettle with the beef and salt pork.

Cook and strain

Cover with water and boil for about 5 hours.
Strain the mixture through a colander.

Season and serve

Season with red pepper and a little wine.
Add the sliced yolks of the hard-boiled eggs and slices of lemon.

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.

Beef + porktop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,690 recipes

Shared aroma: 12-methyltridecanal (tallowy, beefy).
Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together27,047 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,971 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Beans + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,733 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Beans + porktop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,000 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

Black beans: Form the body of the soup and thicken it as they break down during long boiling.
Beef joint or shank: Adds savory depth and body to the broth as it simmers for hours.
Salt pork: Contributes fat and savory flavor to the broth.
Hard-boiled egg yolks: Add a rich, creamy texture and mild savory flavor as a garnish.
Lemon slices: Add bright acidity that balances the richness of the soup.

Swap the beans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, pork, pepper, wine, egg, lemon):

Sesamefits about as well
Beansthe original
Peasfits about as well
Chickpeafits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pork, pepper, wine, egg, lemon. 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.