Why it works: Garlic and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,308 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓
To Boil Sturgeon
Ingredients
Directions
Scrape the skin of the sturgeon and remove the gristle.
Rub the fish with coarse sea salt and let it sit for 1 hour.
Place the sturgeon in cold water with some salt and garlic cloves.
Dredge the fish with flour before adding it to the water.
Skim the surface carefully while it cooks.
Once cooked, serve with melted butter, chopped parsley, mushroom ketchup, lemon pickle, and pepper vinegar.
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.
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Garlic + parsleytop 4% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together9,308 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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Garlic + mushroomtop 6% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,700 recipes
Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).
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Clove + parsleytop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together6,768 recipes
Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
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Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,525 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
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Garlic + clovetop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together11,368 recipes
Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Swap the clove
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sturgeon, flour, garlic, butter, parsley, mushroom, ketchup):
- Thymefits better
- Capersfits better
- Marjoramfits better
- Clovethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sturgeon, flour, garlic, butter, parsley, mushroom, ketchup. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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