Name: Salmon Canapes
Ingredients: stale bread, ¼ inch thick; clarified butter; anchovy butter; smoked salmon, thinly sliced

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 ↓

Salmon Canapes

Ingredients

stale bread, ¼ inch thick
clarified butter
anchovy butter
smoked salmon, thinly sliced

Directions

Cut stale bread into fanciful shapes using a cutter.
Fry the bread in clarified butter until lightly browned.
Let the bread cool.
Spread anchovy butter over the cooled bread.
Top with thin slices of smoked salmon.
Serve the canapés on a small dish.

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).
Bread + anchovytop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,260 recipes

Shared aroma: hexanol (green, fruity).
Anchovy + salmontop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together535 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Butter + anchovytop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,697 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Butter + salmontop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,481 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).