Name: Sweetbread Patties
Ingredients: Short pastry (for lining tartlet molds); Quenelle force-meat; Cooked sweetbreads, small squares; Mushrooms, small squares; Truffles, small squares; Espagnole sauce; Egg (for glazing); Feuilletage paste (for topping)

Why it works: Mushroom and truffle are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,900 recipes. Both carry 2,4-nonadienal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Sweetbread Patties

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Butter eight high-shaped tartlet molds and line them with short pastry.
Spread a little quenelle force-meat inside each mold.
Fill with a mixture of cooked sweetbreads, mushrooms, and truffles, moistened with espagnole sauce.
Spread a little more force-meat on top, wet the edges, and cover with a thin layer of the same pastry.
Make a small hole in the center, glaze the surface with egg, and bake for 20 minutes.
Turn the patties out of the molds, pour a little more sauce through the hole, and top each with a channelled cover of cooked feuilletage paste.
Serve in a pyramidal form on a folded napkin.

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.

Mushroom + truffletop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,900 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).
Meat + truffletop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together527 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Meat + mushroomtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,423 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Truffle + eggtop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,604 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-octenal (fatty, green).
Mushroom + saucetop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,480 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).