Name: Another Recipe for Sausage
Ingredients: 15 pounds lean pork; 7 pounds fat pork; 7 tablespoons coarse sea salt; 7 tablespoons sage; 2½ tablespoons thyme; 6 tablespoons black pepper; 4 tablespoons sweet marjoram

Why it works: Thyme and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

Another Recipe for Sausage

Ingredients

Directions

Mix the lean pork and fat with the salt, sage, thyme, pepper, and sweet marjoram thoroughly.
Store the mixture in a cool, dry place.

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.

Thyme + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,225 recipes

Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).
Sage + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together507 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Sage + thymetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,485 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Pepper + marjoramtop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,609 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,388 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).