Name: Black Eyed Peas with Ham - Good Luck for New Year's!
Prep time: 8 min
Cook time: 1 h 40 min
Yield: 8
Ingredients: 1/2 pound dried black eyed peas; 1 tablespoon olive oil; 2 carrots, diced; 2 stalks celery, diced; 1/2 large onion, diced; 2 cloves garlic, minced; 2 smoked ham hocks; 1 ham bone (or use any pork bones); 6-8 cups water; 3 cups diced ham; 1-2 large tomatoes, diced; 5 handfuls torn kale leaves (tough stems removed); salt to taste

Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

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.

Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together10,173 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together29,058 recipes

Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).
Olive + garlictop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together25,665 recipes

Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).
Carrot + clovetop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,873 recipes

Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together21,601 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (olive, carrot, celery, onion, clove, garlic, ham):

Chickpeafits better
Lentilsfits better
Beansfits better
Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against olive, carrot, celery, onion, clove, garlic, ham. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Pork	100g cooked	242
Ham	100g cooked	145
Olive Oil	1 tbsp (14g)	119
Pea	1/2 cup (72g)	62
Onion	1 medium (110g)	44
Carrot	1 medium (61g)	25
Tomato	1 medium (123g)	22
Spinach	1 cup raw (30g)	7
Celery	1 stalk (40g)	6
Garlic	1 clove (3g)	4
Salt	1 tsp (6g)	0
Water	not in our table	0

Black Eyed Peas with Ham - Good Luck for New Year's!