Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓
Hare Hashed
Ingredients
Directions
Season the hare with salt and pepper.
Add chopped onion and lemon, then pour in the red wine.
Heat until hot, then remove the onion and lemon.
Serve with currant jelly.
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.
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Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together27,047 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together68,474 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Red wine + curranttop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together113 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
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Pepper + red winetop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,075 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).
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Onion + red winetop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,075 recipes
Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Hare
- Provides the meat, which is the main body of the dish.
- Red wine
- Adds acidity and aroma, and helps flavour the meat as it heats.
- Onion
- Adds aromatic flavour to the wine and meat, then is removed before serving.
- Lemon
- Adds sharp acidity and aroma, then is removed before serving.
Swap the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, onion, lemon, red wine):
- Limefits better
- Plumfits better
- Orangefits better
- Currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, onion, lemon, red wine. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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