Name: Pork Sausage Test
Ingredients: 26 pounds pork cuttings; 12 pounds good sausage flour; 2 pounds pepper; 6 ounces saltpeter; cold water (as needed); hog casings (sufficient for 100 pounds of meat); 5 ounces sugar (optional, per 100 pounds of meat)

Why it works: Pork and meat are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,208 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Pork Sausage Test

Ingredients

26 pounds pork cuttings
12 pounds good sausage flour
2 pounds pepper
6 ounces saltpeter
cold water (as needed)
hog casings (sufficient for 100 pounds of meat)
5 ounces sugar (optional, per 100 pounds of meat)

Directions

Ensure pork cuttings are fresh and clean.
Mix pork cuttings with sausage flour, pepper, saltpeter, and sugar if using.
Add enough cold water to achieve a proper consistency.
Stuff the mixture into hog casings.
Use about two bundles of casings for every 100 pounds of meat.

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 + meattop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,208 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together92,116 recipes

Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together22,121 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together50,459 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Pepper + meattop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together8,777 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).