Name: Spanish Corn
Ingredients: 2 tablespoons olive oil; 2 chili copini; 1 clove garlic; 1 can corn

Why it works: Olive and garlic are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 25,665 recipes. Both carry linalool, which smells floral, citrus. The science ↓

Spanish Corn

Ingredients

2 tablespoons olive oil
2 chili copini
1 clove garlic
1 can corn

Directions

Heat the olive oil in a pan until smoking hot.
Add the chili copini and minced garlic.
Stir in the corn and cook on low heat for 20 minutes.

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.

Olive + garlictop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together25,665 recipes

Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).
Olive + corntop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,502 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Clove + garlictop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together11,368 recipes

Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).
Olive + clovetop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,866 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Clove + corntop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together712 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

What each ingredient does

Olive oil: Carries heat and adds fat, helping the other ingredients fry and brown in the pan.
Corn: Forms the main body of the dish, cooking gently until tender and lightly flavored by the oil.
Chili copini: Adds heat and a sharp, peppery flavor that seasons the oil and corn.
Garlic: Adds aroma and savory depth as it cooks briefly in the hot oil.