Name: Force Meat Balls for Soup
Ingredients: 2 ounces grated bread; 3 tablespoons sweet cream; 1 teaspoon salt; ½ teaspoon pepper; ½ teaspoon summer savory; 1 egg, beaten

Why it works: Pepper and summer savory work together. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 671 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Force Meat Balls for Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Chop the veal and pork as finely as possible.
Mix the chopped meat with the grated bread, cream, salt, pepper, summer savory, and beaten egg.
Form the mixture into smooth, round balls slightly larger than marbles.
Roll the balls in egg, then in fine grated bread.
Place them in a frying basket and fry in deep lard until golden.
When the soup is ready, add a dozen or more meatballs to the tureen.

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.

Pepper + summer savorytop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together671 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together22,662 recipes

Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
Bread + summer savorytop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together241 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,964 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Summer savory + eggtop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together327 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).