Why it works: Egg and ham match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and 4,516 recipes mention both. Both carry 2-octenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
The recipe
Ingredients
Contains: egg, milk (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)
Directions
Poach the eggs.
Fry or broil the ham slices until cooked.
Split the English muffins in half, toast them, and spread with butter.
Place the ham on the toasted muffins.
Top the ham with the poached eggs.
Cover the dish with Hollandaise sauce or cream sauce with egg yolk.
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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
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Egg + hamtop 8% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together4,516 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-octenal (fatty, green).
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Ham + buttertop 7% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together5,475 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
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Butter + saucetop 8% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together15,317 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Egg + buttertop 8% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together118,511 recipes
Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
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Ham + saucetop 11% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together1,313 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Butter and sauce share little aroma chemistry, yet 15,317 recipes mention both: they likely 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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Illustration
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