Name: Crab and Portabella Melt
Ingredients: 8 to 10 portabella caps; 1 green pepper — diced; 1 pound mayonnaise; 2 ounces Dijon mustard; 6 to 8 drops Worcestershire; 15 slices cheddar cheese; 2 cups crab meat — jumbo or blackfin; ½ red pepper — diced; ½ lemon — juice of; ¼ to ½ teaspoon Old Bay seasoning; 2 tomatoes — sliced thin

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 ↓

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.

Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together27,047 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Pepper + tomatotop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17,923 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,430 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Lemon + tomatotop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,592 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Mustard + lemontop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together3,816 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Portabella mushroom caps: Form the base that holds the crab mixture while it heats.
Mayonnaise: Adds moisture and richness to the crab mixture, keeping it creamy when heated.
Crab meat: Provides the main seafood filling and its sweet, delicate flavor.
Cheddar cheese: Melts over the top and browns, adding a savory, gooey layer.
Dijon mustard: Adds sharp acidity and tang that balances the rich mayonnaise.

The step that matters

Drain the crab meat well. Excess liquid from the crab would thin the mayonnaise mixture and make the caps watery in the oven, so the filling should be drained before it is folded in.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, mustard, cheddar cheese, crab, tomato):

Avocadofits better
Limefits better
Lemonthe original
Plumfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, mustard, cheddar cheese, crab, tomato. 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
Cheddar Cheese	1 oz (28g)	113
Shrimp	100g cooked	99
Egg	1 large egg (50g)	78
Bell Pepper	1 medium (119g)	31
Tomato	1 medium (123g)	22
Lemon	juice of 1 lemon (48ml)	12
Soy Sauce	1 tbsp (15ml)	9
Chili	1 tsp (2.7g)	8
Mustard	1 tsp (5g) yellow	3
Meat	not in our table	0

Crab and Portabella Melt