Name: Stuffed Onions
Ingredients: 6 even-sized onions; bread crumbs; sage; seasoning of choice; butter; stock or water

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Stuffed Onions

Ingredients

Directions

Parboil the onions until slightly tender.
Remove the centers and drain excess moisture.
Chop the centers and mix with bread crumbs, sage, and desired seasoning.
Fill the onion cavities with the mixture and place a piece of butter on top of each.
Bake in a dish with stock or a mixture of butter and water for 45 minutes.

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.

Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Onion + sagetop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,628 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together42,912 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Bread + sagetop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,778 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Onion + breadtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,676 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).