Why it works: Pork and apple are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,581 recipes. Both carry 4-heptenal, which smells creamy, biscuit. The science ↓
Apples and Bacon
Ingredients
Directions
Fry the bacon or salt pork slices until clear, then keep them hot.
Slice the apples crosswise without peeling or coring.
Fry the apple slices in the hot fat left by the bacon until tender but not broken.
Remove the apples with a slotted spoon, shaking off excess fat, and place them on a hot dish.
Sift fine sugar over the apples and garnish with the bacon.
Serve with cornbread or brown bread.
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.
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Pork + appletop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,581 recipes
Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).
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Apple + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together16,478 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Pork + cornbreadtop 22% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together57 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Sugar + cornbreadtop 24% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Apple + cornbreadtop 24% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together19 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Apple and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 16,478 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 apple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, sugar, cornbread):
- Applethe original
- Raisinfits about as well
- Avocadofits about as well
- Pumpkinfits less well
Fit is the average pairing score against pork, sugar, cornbread. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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