Name: Lopresti Sauce
Ingredients: 6 ounces mustard powder; 6 ounces curry powder; ½ ounce Cayenne pepper; 4 ounces mustard seeds; 3 ounces bruised spices

Why it works: Mustard and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,430 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Lopresti Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Combine the mustard powder and curry powder in a bowl.
Add the Cayenne pepper and mustard seeds.
Mix in the bruised spices until well combined.

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.

Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,430 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Mustard powder: Provides the sharp, pungent flavour that defines the sauce.
Curry powder: Supplies the warm, aromatic spice flavour that forms the base of the blend.
Cayenne pepper: Adds direct heat to the blend.
Mustard seeds: Contribute pungency and a slightly crunchy texture to the mix.
Bruised spices: Release aromatic oils that add depth and fragrance to the blend.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.