Name: Mock Duck
Ingredients: 1 round steak; 2 tablespoons butter or pork fat; ¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt; ¼ teaspoon black pepper; ¼ cup all-purpose flour; 1 cup bread crumbs, soaked; 1 egg; ½ onion, chopped; a little chopped pork

Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Mock Duck

Ingredients

Directions

Spread the round steak with butter or pork fat, then season with salt and pepper.
Dredge the steak with flour.
In a bowl, prepare the dressing by mixing soaked bread crumbs, egg, chopped onion, chopped pork, salt, and pepper.
Spread the dressing on the steak and roll it up like a jelly cake.
Tie the rolled steak in place and baste frequently while cooking.
Serve with gravy, cutting into rounds.

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.

Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Onion + porktop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,214 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together68,474 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Bread + porktop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,371 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

Swap the onion

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

Capsicumfits better
Asparagusfits better
Potatofits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, pepper, flour, bread, egg, pork. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.