Name: Plovers' Eggs, in Cases
Ingredients: fireproof china cases; forcemeat (see recipe for forcemeat); 1-2 chopped mushrooms; herbs (to taste); eggs; rich white sauce; chopped truffle (for garnish); chopped parsley (for garnish); grated ham (for garnish)

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 ↓

Plovers' Eggs, in Cases

Ingredients

Directions

Coat the bottom and sides of each china case with forcemeat.
Fry the chopped mushrooms with herbs, then mix them into the forcemeat for added flavor.
Break an egg into each case and cover with a layer of forcemeat, smoothing it with a knife.
Place the cases in a tin of boiling water in the oven and simmer for about 15 minutes until firm.
Turn out onto a hot dish, pour a little rich white sauce over, and sprinkle with chopped truffle, parsley, and grated ham.
Serve hot.

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).
Mushroom + parsleytop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,132 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Truffle + hamtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together516 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,486 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
Egg + hamtop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,526 recipes

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mushroom, egg, sauce, truffle, ham):

Capersfits better
Thymefits about as well
Parsleythe original
Tarragonfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, egg, sauce, truffle, ham. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.