Name: Bread
Ingredients: 1 handful good hops; 1 quart water; 6 large potatoes; sufficient flour; 1 pint yeast; 1 tablespoon salt; Indian meal

Why it works: Potato and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,355 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Bread

Ingredients

Directions

Boil hops in 1 quart of water in a little bag.
Pare and add potatoes to the boiling water until soft.
Pass the potatoes through a colander, moistening with hot water.
Squeeze the bag of hops and return the pulp to the water.
Stir the mixture and bring it to a boil.
Pour the hot mixture over enough flour to make a thin batter.
When tepid, add 1 pint of yeast and mix well.
Store in a crock with a lid in a cool place.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

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.

Potato + flourtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,355 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Hops + flourtop 32% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together10 recipes

Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).
Hops + potatotop 39% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3 recipes

Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).