Why it works: Flour and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Suet Crust
Ingredients
Directions
Combine suet and flour in a bowl.
Add cold water gradually to form a paste.
Roll out the paste to ½ inch thick, larger than the pie dish.
Cut out a lid for the pie using a slanted knife.
Fold the lid with the outside in and set aside.
Beat the egg and brush it over the edge of the pie dish.
Cut out trimmings from the paste and brush them with egg.
Place the lid on the pie and create a decorative edge with a knife.
Glaze the top with egg and add decorative ornaments.
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.
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Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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
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