Name: Beef Sausages
Ingredients: 3 pounds lean beef; 1½ pounds suet; powdered sage; allspice; black pepper; coarse sea salt; sausage casings or additional ingredients for cakes

Why it works: Sage and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 331 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Beef Sausages

Ingredients

Directions

Chop the beef and suet very finely.
Season the mixture with sage, allspice, black pepper, and coarse sea salt.
Stuff the seasoned meat into thoroughly cleaned sausage casings or shape into cakes.

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.

Sage + allspicetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together331 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,388 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Allspice + peppertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together6,395 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,971 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Beef + allspicetop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,940 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).