Name: Tarragon Gelatin
Ingredients: 1/3 cup cold water; 2 tablespoons tarragon vinegar; lettuce leaves; mayonnaise

Why it works: Tarragon and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 425 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Tarragon Gelatin

Ingredients

1/3 cup cold water
2 tablespoons tarragon vinegar
lettuce leaves
mayonnaise

Directions

Soak gelatin in cold water until dissolved.
Add tarragon vinegar and stir well.
Pour mixture into wetted molds.
Once firm, serve on lettuce leaves and garnish with mayonnaise.

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.

Tarragon + lettucetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together425 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Tarragon + vinegartop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,547 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Vinegar + lettucetop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,370 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).