Why it works: Bread and ham are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,536 recipes. Both carry 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline, which smells popcorn, roasted. The science ↓
Minced Ham
Ingredients
Directions
Butter both pieces of bread.
Spread one piece with the moistened ham.
Place the other piece on top.
Trim the edges of the sandwich.
Wrap the sandwich in wax paper.
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.
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Bread + hamtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,536 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
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Bread + milktop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together11,466 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
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Ham + milktop 23% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,089 recipes
Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Bread
- Forms the structure that holds the filling together.
- Ham
- Provides the savory filling that defines the sandwich.
“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.
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