Why it works: Cranberry and pecans share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and 33 recipes mention both. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓
The recipe
12 cupsIngredients
Contains: milk, tree nuts (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)
Directions
Method written by CompKitchen from the ingredient list. Not the original author's method, not kitchen-tested.
Preheat the oven to 350°F (177°C). Cook the bacon in a large skillet over medium heat until crisp, about 8 minutes. Drain on paper towels, crumble, and leave the drippings in the skillet.
Add the butter to the drippings over medium heat. Stir in the celery, onion, and garlic and cook until soft, about 8 minutes.
Pour in the white wine and simmer until slightly reduced, about 3 minutes.
Stir in the cranberry sauce, diced jalapeno peppers, and diced green chiles. Cook 2 minutes, breaking up the cranberry sauce with a spoon.
In a large bowl, combine the cornbread stuffing mix, the cranberry mixture, the chopped toasted pecans, and the crumbled bacon.
Warm the chicken stock until hot, pour it over the stuffing, and toss until evenly moistened.
Spoon the stuffing into a greased 9x13-inch baking dish. Cover with foil and bake 20 minutes.
Uncover and bake 15 more minutes until golden on top and heated through.
Let the stuffing rest 5 minutes before serving.
Explore the science
The flavor team
The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
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Cranberry + pecanstop 6% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together33 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
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Garlic + oniontop 1% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together29,030 recipes
Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).
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Berry + cranberrytop 2% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together68 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).
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Butter + white winetop 3% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together5,039 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
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Butter + pecanstop 4% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together2,408 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Flavor stand-ins for the celery
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, garlic, onion, white wine, berry, cranberry, sauce):
- Thymebetter flavor fit
- Gingerbetter flavor fit
- Parsleybetter flavor fit
- Celerythe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, garlic, onion, white wine, berry, cranberry, sauce. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).
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