Name: Mixed Sandwiches
Ingredients: 1 pint chopped ham; 1 pint chopped tongues; 1 pint chopped chicken; ½ cup melted butter; 1 tablespoon mustard; 1 egg yolk; ¼ teaspoon pepper; thin bread; butter for spreading

Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Mixed Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

Chop the ham, tongues, and chicken finely.
In a bowl, mix the chopped meats with melted butter, mustard, egg yolk, and pepper.
Spread the mixture on thin slices of buttered bread.

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.

Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Ham + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,536 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,430 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Chicken + mustardtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,192 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).
Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together22,662 recipes

Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolk: Binds the chopped meats and melted butter into a cohesive spreadable mixture.
Melted butter: Adds moisture and richness, keeping the meat filling soft and spreadable.
Mustard: Adds sharp, savoury flavour that cuts through the richness of the meats and butter.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, chicken, butter, egg, pepper, bread):

Capsicumfits better
Asparagusfits better
Potatofits about as well
Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, chicken, butter, egg, pepper, bread. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.