Name: Dinner. — Liver with Potato Salad.
Ingredients: liver; potatoes; salt; pepper; vinegar; oil

Why it works: Potato and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,305 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Dinner. — Liver with Potato Salad.

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the liver in a pan until browned and cooked through.
Boil the potatoes until tender, then drain and let cool.
Peel and slice the potatoes.
In a bowl, mix the potatoes with salt, pepper, vinegar, and oil.
Serve the liver alongside the potato salad.

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.

Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,305 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,814 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Potato + vinegartop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,608 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Liver + vinegartop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together345 recipes

Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).
Liver + peppertop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,375 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).