Name: Full Diet
Ingredients: 12 oz. bread; 2 oz. butter; ½ pint tea; milk; sugar; 4 oz. beef or mutton; 1 lb. potatoes or fresh vegetables; ½ pint milk

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Full Diet

Ingredients

Directions

For breakfast, serve 12 oz. of bread with 2 oz. of butter and ½ pint of tea with milk and sugar.
Repeat the same for tea.
Serve 4 oz. of cooked beef or mutton, alternating between roast and boiled.
Include 1 lb. of potatoes or fresh vegetables.
Provide ½ pint of milk in the forenoon.

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.

Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Beef + potatotop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,052 recipes

Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).
Milk + potatotop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,611 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).
Tea + potatotop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together136 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).