Name: Pickled Ham and Smoked Sausage
Ingredients: boned ham; 1% molasses or sugar (optional); fresh pork; salt; pepper; small percentage of beef (optional)

Why it works: Pork and beef 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 ↓

Pickled Ham and Smoked Sausage

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the boned ham before pickling for better flavor.
If desired, mix 1% molasses or sugar with the salt for flavoring.
For smoked sausage, combine fresh pork with salt and pepper.
Optionally, add a small percentage of beef to improve color.
Fill the mixture into sausage skins.
Use a drying process to improve the ham for eating raw and prevent leakage during transportation.

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.

Pork + beeftop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,690 recipes

Shared aroma: 12-methyltridecanal (tallowy, beefy).
Pepper + beeftop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,971 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Ham + porktop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,638 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
Ham + beeftop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,729 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together22,121 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).