Name: Neufchatel Sandwiches
Ingredients: Neufchatel cheese; chopped nuts; paprika; rye bread or bran bread

Why it works: Nuts and rye work together. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 32 recipes. Both carry ethyl decanoate, which smells grape, waxy. The science ↓

Neufchatel Sandwiches

Ingredients

Neufchatel cheese
chopped nuts
paprika
rye bread or bran bread

Directions

Mix Neufchatel cheese with an equal quantity of chopped nuts.
Season the mixture with paprika.
Spread the mixture between slices of rye or bran bread.
Serve at informal lunches with coffee.

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.

Nuts + ryetop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together32 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl decanoate (grape, waxy).
Cheese + nutstop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together101 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl decanoate (grape, waxy).
Cheese + ryetop 25% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together34 recipes

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