Name: Peaches with Rice
Ingredients: 4 large peaches; 1 cup sugar; 2 cups water; 1 cup rice; 2 tablespoons butter

Why it works: Peach and rice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 171 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Peaches with Rice

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the peaches

Peel the peaches, cut them in half, and remove the stones.
In a saucepan, combine the sugar and water to make a syrup; bring to a boil.
Add the peaches to the syrup and stew until tender.

Cook the rice

In another pot, boil the rice until tender; drain.
Stir in the butter and mix well.

Serve

Serve a spoonful of rice on a pudding dish, top with half a peach, and pour some syrup over.

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.

Peach + ricetop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together171 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Peach + buttertop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together860 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
Rice + buttertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,645 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together98,233 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Peach + sugartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,308 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).