Name: Paupiettes of Anchovy
Ingredients: thick slices of blanched cucumber; anchovy fillets in oil; cream of any fish or shellfish

Why it works: Anchovy and cream work together. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 798 recipes. Both carry octanal, which smells fat, soap. The science ↓

Paupiettes of Anchovy

Ingredients

thick slices of blanched cucumber
anchovy fillets in oil
cream of any fish or shellfish

Directions

Prepare thick slices of blanched cucumber, about the size of half-crowns, and hollow their centers slightly.
Place rings of anchovy fillets in oil on the cucumber slices.
Fill the centers with cream of any fish or shellfish.

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.

Anchovy + creamtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together798 recipes

Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).
Cucumber + anchovytop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together134 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Cucumber + creamtop 29% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together787 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).