Name: Codfish a LA Shaker
Ingredients: uncooked salt fish, shredded; hot water; butter; flour; 1 beaten egg (optional); parsley for garnish; eggs (as needed)

Why it works: Fish and butter match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and 4,432 recipes mention both. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Contains: egg, milk, wheat, fish (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Shred the uncooked salt fish into pieces about 1 inch in size.
Place the fish in a tin pan and cover it with hot water.
Keep the water at a boiling point for 45 minutes without letting it boil.
Drain the water and add more boiling water to achieve your desired moisture.
In a separate bowl, mix a heaping spoonful of butter with a little flour.
Stir this mixture into the fish, keeping it hot enough for the flour to cook.
If desired, add a beaten egg and allow it to cook.
Transfer the fish to a platter and keep it hot.
Drop the eggs into boiling water and cook until the whites are set.
Carefully place the eggs on top of the fish and garnish with parsley.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

Fish + buttertop 5% of all pairs

Aroma overlapstrong

Mentioned together4,432 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Butter + flourtop 6% of all pairs

Aroma overlaplow

Mentioned together122,858 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter + parsleytop 8% of all pairs

Aroma overlapmoderate

Mentioned together28,543 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Butter + eggtop 8% of all pairs

Aroma overlapstrong

Mentioned together118,511 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Flour + eggtop 8% of all pairs

Aroma overlaplow

Mentioned together104,138 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour share little aroma chemistry, yet 122,858 recipes mention both: they likely work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

Flavor stand-ins for the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, butter, flour, egg):

Capersabout as good a flavor fit
Nutmegabout as good a flavor fit
Parsleythe original
Tarragonabout as good a flavor fit

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, butter, flour, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).