Name: Cheese and Anchovy Sandwiches
Ingredients: 2 tablespoons butter; 1 teaspoon vinegar; ½ cup grated American cheese; paprika to taste; mustard to taste; anchovy essence to taste; thin slices of bread

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 ↓

Cheese and Anchovy Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

Cream the butter in a bowl.
Add the grated cheese and vinegar, mixing well.
Season with paprika, mustard, and anchovy essence to taste.

Assemble

Spread the mixture between thin slices of bread.

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).
Cheese + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,130 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together14,067 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter + cheesetop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,962 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Anchovy + breadtop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,260 recipes

Shared aroma: hexanol (green, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter: Creamed to form the base that binds the filling and gives it a soft, spreadable texture.
American cheese: Adds richness and savoury flavour, and melts into the butter to make a cohesive spread.
Vinegar: Adds a touch of acidity that brightens the rich butter and cheese.
Anchovy essence: Contributes a salty, savoury depth of flavour to the filling.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, vinegar, cheese, anchovy, bread):

Mustardthe original
Tomatofits about as well
Capsicumfits about as well
Onionfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, vinegar, cheese, anchovy, bread. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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.