Name: Jerk-seasoned Pork Chops and Shrimp
Ingredients: 1 small onion, chopped; 2 tbs vegetable oil; 2 tbs lime juice; 4 cloves garlic, chopped; 2 scallions, trimmed and sliced; 1 tsp salt; 1 tsp ground allspice; 1 tsp dried thyme; ½ tsp nutmeg; ½ tsp cinnamon; ½ tsp pepper; ½ tsp hot pepper sauce; 6 boneless loin pork chops; 18 jumbo shrimp, shelled and deveined

Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. 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.

Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together11,917 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together14,189 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together7,874 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Allspice + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,536 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Allspice + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together3,331 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Pork loin chops: Provide the main meat, which the marinade flavours and the grill browns.
Jumbo shrimp: Cook quickly on the grill, absorbing marinade flavour in the short time added.
Lime juice: Adds acidity that brightens the marinade and helps tenderise the surface of the meat.
Garlic: Adds pungent aroma and savoury depth to the marinade.
Vegetable oil: Carries the spices and helps prevent the grill rack from sticking.

The step that matters

Timing the shrimp on the grill. Shrimp cook in only a few minutes and turn rubbery when overcooked, so they need watching while the thicker pork cooks alongside them.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lime, clove, garlic, allspice, thyme, nutmeg, cinnamon):

Shallotfits better
Parsnipfits better
Sweet potatofits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lime, clove, garlic, allspice, thyme, nutmeg, cinnamon. 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.

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Pork	100g cooked	242
Olive Oil	1 tbsp (14g)	119
Shrimp	100g cooked	99
Onion	1 medium (110g)	44
Nutmeg	1 tsp ground (2.2g)	12
Lime	juice of 1 lime (44ml)	11
Cinnamon	1 tsp ground (2.6g)	6
Black Pepper	1 tsp ground (2.3g)	6
Allspice	1 tsp ground (1.9g)	5
Garlic	1 clove (3g)	4
Thyme	1 tsp dried (1.4g)	4
Salt	1 tsp (6g)	0
Sauce	not in our table	0

Jerk-seasoned Pork Chops and Shrimp