Why it works: Milk and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 77,875 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Porridge
Ingredients
Directions
Make the porridge
Boil 1 pint of water.
Gradually stir in 1 ounce of oatmeal and ½ teaspoon of salt using a wooden spoon.
Let the porridge boil for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally to prevent sticking.
Serve
Pour it out and serve with milk or cream.
Add sugar or golden syrup if desired.
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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Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together77,875 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Oatmeal
- Its starch thickens the water into a creamy porridge as it cooks.
- Water
- Cooks the oatmeal and carries the starch, forming the porridge's base texture.
- Milk or cream
- Adds richness and softens the porridge's flavour when served.
The step that matters
Stirring in the oatmeal gradually. Adding oatmeal slowly while stirring keeps it from clumping, and stirring during the boil prevents it sticking to the pan and scorching on the base.
“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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