Name: Pickling Lamb Tongues
Ingredients: lamb tongues; coarse sea salt; saltpetre; white vinegar; small red pepper pods; coriander seed; allspice; bay leaves; sliced lemon

Why it works: Coriander and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,498 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Pickling Lamb Tongues

Ingredients

Directions

Scald the lamb tongues and remove the skin while the meat is still warm.
Chill the tongues thoroughly.
Cure the tongues in a sweet pickle at a temperature of 60 to 65 degrees Fahrenheit for about five days.
Cook the tongues in boiling water for 1.5 to 2 hours, then chill properly.
Soak the tongues in white vinegar for at least ten days before repacking with desired spices.

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.

Coriander + lemontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,498 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together27,047 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Coriander + allspicetop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together393 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together6,395 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Pepper + coriandertop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,949 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

Swap the allspice

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lamb, vinegar, pepper, coriander, lemon):

Parsleyfits better
Cardamomfits better
Peppermintfits better
Allspicethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lamb, vinegar, pepper, coriander, lemon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.