Name: Steamed Bread or Biscuit
Ingredients: dry bread or biscuits; butter; cold meat (boiled, roasted, or pressed); grated ham; mustard

Why it works: Bread and butter 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 ↓

Steamed Bread or Biscuit

Ingredients

Directions

Steam dry bread or biscuits for a few minutes until warm.
Cut the bread into even slices of medium thickness.
Spread each slice thinly with butter.
Place a thin slice of cold meat or grated ham on one half of the slice.
Add mustard if desired, then top with the other half of the slice.

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.

Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,536 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
Meat + hamtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,095 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Meat + mustardtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together855 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Ham + mustardtop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together747 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).