Name: Tangerine Creams
Ingredients: 1 dozen tangerines; gum arabic solution; bonbon cream; orange food coloring; green stems; green leaves

Why it works: Tangerine and orange work together. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 103 recipes. Both carry 2,4-nonadienal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Tangerine Creams

Ingredients

Directions

Peel the tangerines and carefully separate each slice.
Dip the slices in gum arabic solution and let them dry.
Melt bonbon cream over steam and color it orange.
Dip each tangerine slice in the orange bonbon cream.
For whole tangerines, peel them and dip in fondant.
Place a green stem in the center and a green leaf on each side.
Arrange the whole tangerines on paper doilies.

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.

Tangerine + orangetop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together103 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).
Cream + orangetop 28% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,170 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Tangerine + creamtop 39% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together26 recipes