Name: Salt Cod
Ingredients: salt cod; water; milk; potatoes; fat for frying; onion; salt

Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Salt Cod

Ingredients

Directions

Soak the salt cod in water overnight to freshen it.
Place the cod in cold water and bring it gradually to a boil.
Reduce heat and keep the cod hot for half an hour.
Separate the flakes of cod and serve with a milk sauce.
For fish balls, mix shredded cod with an equal amount of mashed potatoes.
Form the mixture into balls and fry in a griddle or boiling fat.

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.

Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,023 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Milk + potatotop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,611 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).
Milk + oniontop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together13,418 recipes

Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).