Why it works: Onion and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,585 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓
Mutton Collops
Ingredients
Directions
Cut rounds of mutton about the size of a 5-shilling piece.
Fry the mutton rounds in hot dripping with a few slices of onion until browned on both sides.
Stew the meat in thick brown sauce for 2 hours.
Serve the collops surrounded by a border of mashed turnips.
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.
-
Onion + turniptop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together7,585 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
-
Mutton + oniontop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together4,531 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
-
Onion + saucetop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together10,474 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
-
Mutton + turniptop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1,558 recipes
Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).
-
Sauce + turniptop 20% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together943 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Onion and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 10,474 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
Swap the turnip
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, onion, sauce):
- Shallotfits about as well
- Tomatofits about as well
- Turnipthe original
- Leekfits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, onion, sauce. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
You might also like
Mutton Broth292 recipes
Haricot Mutton59 recipes
Mutton Soup56 recipes
Turnip Soup43 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.