Name: Cheese Balls
Ingredients: mild cheese; cayenne pepper; finely chopped parsley or nuts

Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Cheese Balls

Ingredients

mild cheese
cayenne pepper
finely chopped parsley or nuts

Directions

Grate the mild cheese or rub it through a coarse sieve if soft enough.
Season the cheese with cayenne pepper.
Take tablespoonfuls of the mixture and form them into balls.
Roll each ball in finely chopped parsley or nuts.
Serve with salad.

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.

Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together34,122 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Cheese + peppertop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,861 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Cheese + parsleytop 25% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,507 recipes

Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).