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Cretan Pourgouri

You can serve this warm or cold. There are some really delicious flavors in this healthy bulgur salad.

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Why it works: Mint and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and 1,998 recipes mention both. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

The recipe

Serves 4
Prep8 min
Cook12 min

Ingredients

Contains: milk (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.

  1. Bring a pan of boiling water to a boil, add the bulgur and butter, cover, and simmer on low for about 10 minutes until the bulgur is tender and the water is absorbed.

  2. Stir in the cinnamon, remove the pan from the heat, keep it covered for 2 minutes, then fluff the bulgur with a fork and let it cool slightly.

  3. Zest the lemon, then juice it. In a bowl, combine the chopped peaches, chopped mint and lemon zest.

  4. In a small bowl, whisk the lemon juice with the olive oil, and crumble the oregano between your fingers into the dressing.

  5. Add the bulgur to the peach mixture, pour over the dressing and toss gently until evenly combined.

  6. Fold in the feta crumbles just before serving so they stay intact, then serve the salad at room temperature or chilled.

By tastykitchen. Recipe from Open Recipes.

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.

  1. Mint + lemontop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,998 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Lemon + oreganotop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together784 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Mint + oreganotop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together143 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Olive + oreganotop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together3,288 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Cinnamon + oreganotop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together176 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

Flavor stand-ins for the peach

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bulgur, butter, cinnamon, mint, lemon, olive, oregano):

  1. Limebetter flavor fit
  2. Orangebetter flavor fit
  3. Cherrybetter flavor fit
  4. Peachthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bulgur, butter, cinnamon, mint, lemon, olive, oregano. 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).