Name: How We Cook in Tennessee
Ingredients: one quart of okra; three quarts of boiling water; one pint of prepared tomatoes; three slices of unboiled ham; three pinches of mace; two-thirds teaspoon salt; one tablespoon of file; one tablespoonful of water; one pinch of salt; one cupful of cooked meat through a food; one teaspoonful of lemon juice; a bunch of sweet herbs tied in muslin; a pinch of nutmeg; a pinch of cayenne pepper; 13 fry till brown; one onion; one old chicken cut into joints; one dozen large oysters; four cloves; 6 o'clock dinner put the gumbo over the fire at 1 o'clock; 1 o'clock; 14 how we cook in tennessee; half cup; two eggs; one egg; one salt- spoonful each of salt; one teaspoon- ful of chopped parsley; one egg to moisten; pepper; salt

Why it works: Lemon and pepper 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.

Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together27,047 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Okra + tomatotop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together327 recipes

Shared aroma: damascenone (apple, rose).
Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,557 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together11,318 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Okra + lemontop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together86 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken: Browning and cooking down into the stock give the soup its body and savoury depth.
Filé: Thickens the gumbo and adds its characteristic earthy aroma when stirred in off the heat.
Oysters: Add briny flavour, and cooking them briefly keeps them plump and tender.
Ham: Contributes smoky, savoury flavour to the simmering broth.

The step that matters

Do not let the filé boil. Filé powder becomes stringy and loses its thickening and flavour when boiled, so it is stirred in just as the pot leaves the stove.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (okra, tomato, ham, meat, lemon, nutmeg, pepper):

Thymefits better
Parsleyfits better
Marjoramfits better
Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against okra, tomato, ham, meat, lemon, nutmeg, 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
Pork	100g cooked	242
Chicken	100g cooked	165
Oyster	6 medium (84g)	81
Egg	1 large egg (50g)	78
Onion	1 medium (110g)	44
Okra	1 cup (100g)	33
Tomato	1 medium (123g)	22
Lemon	juice of 1 lemon (48ml)	12
Nutmeg	1 tsp ground (2.2g)	12
Chili	1 tsp (2.7g)	8
Clove	1 tsp ground (2g)	7
Black Pepper	1 tsp ground (2.3g)	6
Cayenne	1 tsp (1.8g)	6
Allspice	1 tsp ground (1.9g)	5
Thyme	1 tsp dried (1.4g)	4
Parsley	1 tbsp chopped fresh (3.8g)	1
Salt	1 tsp (6g)	0
Water	not in our table	0
Mace	not in our table	0
Meat	not in our table	0

How We Cook in Tennessee