Name: Roast Ham -with Spinach
Ingredients: 1 ham; water for soaking; coarse sea salt; spinach; fat from the salt meat boiler

Why it works: Ham and meat are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,095 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Roast Ham -with Spinach

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Scrape and shave off the outside of the ham and saw off the rank end of the knuckle bone.
Soak the ham in water for 12 hours before cooking.
Boil the ham in salted water for 2 to 3 hours, depending on its size.
Remove the ham, take off the rind, and trim it slightly.
Bake the ham at 400°F (200°C) until brown and shiny, about 30 minutes.
Serve the ham on top of spinach, similar to corned beef and cabbage.

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.

Ham + meattop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,095 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Spinach + meattop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together263 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
Ham + spinachtop 26% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together144 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).