Name: Stuffed Cucumbers
Ingredients: large cucumbers; coarse sea salt; fat bacon; well-seasoned veal farce; reduced Espagnole sauce

Why it works: Cucumber and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,174 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Stuffed Cucumbers

Ingredients

Directions

Scrape out the seeds from the cucumbers and peel them.
Soak the cucumbers in a mixture of salt and water for 1 hour, then dry them with a cloth.
Boil the cucumbers for 10 minutes, then dry them again.
Fill the cucumbers with well-seasoned veal farce.
Line the bottom of a stewpan with slices of fat bacon and place the cucumbers inside.
Cover the cucumbers with more fat bacon and cook over low heat until done.
Serve the cucumbers and drizzle with reduced Espagnole sauce.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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.

Cucumber + saucetop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,174 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Cucumber + vealtop 23% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together439 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
Veal + saucetop 27% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,072 recipes

Shared aroma: decanoic acid (soapy, waxy).