Name: Ham Baked with Macaroni
Ingredients: 1 butt of ham; ½ cup macaroni; 1 cup chopped ham; 1 tablespoon chopped onion; ¼ cup grated cheese; Salt to taste; Pepper to taste; Butter for greasing; Buttered bread crumbs

Why it works: Butter and bread 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 ↓

Ham Baked with Macaroni

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

Boil the butt of ham until tender, then remove the meat and chop it.
Cook the macaroni in salted water until tender.

Assemble and bake

Combine the cooked macaroni, chopped ham, chopped onion, grated cheese, salt, and pepper in a bowl, then mix the mixture well.
Transfer the mixture to a buttered baking dish.
Sprinkle the top with buttered bread crumbs.
Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 30 minutes.

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.

Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,130 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,536 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,962 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Macaroni: Forms the bulk and body of the bake, holding the mixture together as it cooks.
Ham: Supplies the savoury, meaty flavour that defines the dish.
Grated cheese: Melts into the mixture, adding richness and binding the pasta and ham together.
Buttered bread crumbs: Form a golden, crisp topping as the dish bakes.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, cheese, pepper, butter, bread):

Capsicumfits about as well
Mustardfits about as well
Tomatofits about as well
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, cheese, pepper, butter, bread. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.