Name: Beef Sandwiches
Ingredients: fresh raw beef; coarse sea salt; black pepper; thin slices of bread

Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Beef Sandwiches

Ingredients

fresh raw beef
coarse sea salt
black pepper
thin slices of bread

Directions

Scrape a small piece of fresh, juicy, tender raw beef finely.
Season the beef highly with coarse sea salt and black pepper.
Spread the seasoned beef on thin slices of bread.
Put the slices together like a sandwich and cut into small squares or diamonds.
Optionally, toast the sandwiches slightly for added flavor.

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.

Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,971 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Beef + breadtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,032 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,964 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).