Why it works: Turkey and pork work together. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 830 recipes. Both carry trans-2-decenal, which smells waxy, orange. The science ↓
Turkey Roast
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.
Lay slices of pickled pork over the turkey breast and under the wings.
Mix flour and water to make a paste and spread it over the pork.
Roast the turkey in a 350°F (175°C) oven, basting as usual.
Remove the paste cover 10 to 15 minutes before taking the turkey out of the oven.
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.
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Turkey + porktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together830 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
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Turkey + flourtop 22% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together963 recipes
Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).
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Pork + flourtop 27% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together11,187 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Pork and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 11,187 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
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