Name: Devilled Clams
Ingredients: clams; bread crumbs; pepper; cream; butter

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Devilled Clams

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the clams

Open the clams carefully to avoid breaking the shells.
Chop the clams well and mix with bread crumbs, pepper, and a little cream.

Fill and bake

Fill each shell with the mixture.
Grate a little bread over the tops and add a small lump of butter.
Bake until brown.

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.

Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Clam + buttertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together840 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,964 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Clam + breadtop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together125 recipes

Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Clams: Provide the main body of the filling and its seafood flavor.
Bread crumbs: Absorb moisture and give the filling body, with crisp tops when baked.
Cream: Adds moisture and richness so the filling stays tender rather than dry.
Butter: Adds fat that helps the topping brown and gives a rich flavor.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.