Name: Fried Pork Steaks
Ingredients: slices of salt pork; flour; pepper; coarse sea salt; slices of apple

Why it works: Pork and apple are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,581 recipes. Both carry 4-heptenal, which smells creamy, biscuit. The science ↓

Fried Pork Steaks

Ingredients

Directions

Fry the slices of salt pork in a frying pan.
Remove the pork from the pan.
Dredge the pork steaks with flour, pepper, and coarse sea salt.
Fry the pork steaks slowly for 15 to 20 minutes.
Fry slices of apple in the remaining fat to serve with the pork.

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.

Pork + appletop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,581 recipes

Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).
Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together22,121 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Pepper + appletop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,026 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together50,459 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + appletop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,140 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).