Name: Pickled Tripe
Ingredients: 1 pint vinegar; ½ teaspoon coarse sea salt; 12 peppercorns; 6 cloves; ½ small bay leaf; a tiny bit of mace; 1 small onion, finely chopped; several pounds of tripe

Why it works: Clove and mace are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,400 recipes. Both carry methyleugenol, which smells clove, spice. The science ↓

Pickled Tripe

Ingredients

Directions

Boil vinegar, salt, peppercorns, cloves, bay leaf, mace, and onion for 5 minutes.
Pour the hot mixture over the tripe in a stone crock or glass jar.
Store in a cold place.

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.

Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together8,400 recipes

Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).
Clove + oniontop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together16,901 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).
Vinegar + oniontop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,226 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Vinegar + clovetop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together10,386 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Mace + oniontop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together7,078 recipes

Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).

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

What each ingredient does

Vinegar: Provides the acidity that makes the brine sharp and helps preserve the tripe.
Tripe: The main food being pickled, soaking up the flavoured vinegar brine.
Onion: Adds savoury sweetness and aroma to the brine as it cooks.
Peppercorns: Release warm, sharp aroma into the brine during boiling.
Cloves: Add a strong, warm aroma to the pickling liquid.