Name: Crab Fried Rice
Yield: 5
Ingredients: 5 tbsp olive oil; 2 cloves garlic , minced; 2 cloves red onion , sliced; 150 g bean sprouts , soaked in hot water; 2 big red chilli , cut into small pieces; 2 cans (200 g) crab , drained; 3 scallion , cut into 1 cm pieces; 1 plate (500 g) cooked rice; 2 tbsp fish sauce; 1 tbsp salt; 1 tbsp black pepper

Why it works: Garlic and onion match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 29,058 recipes. Both carry furaneol, which smells caramel, strawberry. 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.

Garlic + oniontop 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).
Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together17,451 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
Olive + ricetop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together4,994 recipes

Shared aroma: trans,trans-2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).
Garlic + peppertop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,090 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Crab: Provides the main protein and savoury seafood flavour, and is cooked only briefly to stay tender.
Cooked rice: Forms the bulk of the dish and absorbs the oil and seasonings as it is stir fried.
Olive oil: Carries heat evenly and carries the flavour of the garlic and onion through the dish.
Garlic: Releases aromatic compounds when fried briefly in oil, giving the dish its base fragrance.
Fish sauce: Adds salty, savoury depth that rounds out the flavour of the rice.
Bean sprouts: Add a crisp, fresh texture that contrasts with the soft rice and crab.

The step that matters

Stir fry the crab for only 1 minute. Crab is already cooked, so extra heat squeezes out moisture and toughens its protein, leaving it rubbery rather than tender.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (olive, garlic, onion, crab, rice, fish sauce, pepper):

Turmericfits better
Corianderfits better
Cuminfits better
Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against olive, garlic, onion, crab, rice, fish sauce, pepper. 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
Rice	1 cup cooked (158g) white	206
Olive Oil	1 tbsp (14g)	119
Shrimp	100g cooked	99
Onion	1 medium (110g)	44
Soy Sauce	1 tbsp (15ml)	9
Clove	1 tsp ground (2g)	7
Black Pepper	1 tsp ground (2.3g)	6
Garlic	1 clove (3g)	4
Salt	1 tsp (6g)	0
Bean	not in our table	0
Water	not in our table	0

Crab Fried Rice

Crab Fried Rice

Ingredients

Directions

Fry the crab and aromatics

Combine and serve

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)