Name: Duhe of York's Universal Sauce
Ingredients: 1 tablespoon black peppercorns; 1 cup chopped parsley (or any other herb); 2 teaspoons coarse sea salt; 1 cup water; 1 teaspoon white vinegar (or tarragon vinegar, or lemon juice)

Why it works: Parsley and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,477 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Duhe of York's Universal Sauce

Ingredients

1 tablespoon black peppercorns
1 cup chopped parsley (or any other herb)
2 teaspoons coarse sea salt
1 cup water
1 teaspoon white vinegar (or tarragon vinegar, or lemon juice)

Directions

Pound the dried toast and black peppercorns in a mortar.
Boil the pounded mixture with chopped parsley and coarse sea salt in water.
After boiling, add the white vinegar, tarragon vinegar, or lemon juice.

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.

Parsley + vinegartop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,477 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

Wine Sauce (for stewed fruit)186 recipes

Caper Sauce180 recipes

Brown Sauce141 recipes

Dutch Sauce74 recipes

Like knowing why a recipe works?

The free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.

Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.

Duhe of York's Universal Sauce