Name: Bean Soup
Ingredients: 8 ounces bean soup; 4 ounces bread; 10 ounces fresh fish or 8 ounces salt fish; 8 ounces potatoes; 6 ounces other vegetables; 1 ounce pickles

Why it works: Bread and fish are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,668 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓

Bean Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare 8 ounces of bean soup.
Serve with 4 ounces of bread.
Choose 10 ounces of fresh fish or 8 ounces of salt fish.
Boil 8 ounces of potatoes until tender.
Steam or cook 6 ounces of other vegetables.
Add 1 ounce of pickles on the side.

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.

Bread + fishtop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,668 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
Fish + potatotop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together134 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).
Bread + potatotop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together434 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).