Name: Mutton Croquettes
Ingredients: meat from a neck of mutton; bacon; stock; sweet herbs; fowl seasoning; egg; bread crumbs

Why it works: Mutton and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,488 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Mutton Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Cut the mutton into pieces about the size of your finger.
Lard the pieces with bacon and simmer them in stock with sweet herbs until cooked.
Remove the meat and reduce the gravy, then strain it over the pieces.
Season each piece with fowl seasoning and wrap it in a slice of bacon.
Brush with egg and sprinkle with bread crumbs.
Bake at 350°F (175°C) until golden.

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.

Mutton + breadtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,488 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together22,662 recipes

Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
Meat + muttontop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together936 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Meat + breadtop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,924 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Meat + eggtop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,432 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).