Name: Sunday Night Sandwich
Ingredients: 1 cup cold ham, minced fine; 5 olives, chopped; 1 tender stalk of celery, chopped; thin slices of white bread; salad dressing, to taste

Why it works: Ham and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,536 recipes. Both carry 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline, which smells popcorn, roasted. The science ↓

Sunday Night Sandwich

Ingredients

1 cup cold ham, minced fine
5 olives, chopped
1 tender stalk of celery, chopped
thin slices of white bread
salad dressing, to taste

Directions

In a bowl, combine the minced ham, chopped olives, and chopped celery.
Spread a small amount of salad dressing into the mixture.
Place the mixture between two slices of white bread.
Cut the sandwich into desired portions and serve.

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.

Ham + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,536 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,091 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
Olive + celerytop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,667 recipes

Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
Celery + breadtop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,110 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Ham + celerytop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,608 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Cold ham: Supplies the savoury meat filling that forms the body of the sandwich.
Olives: Add briny, salty flavour that contrasts with the mild ham.
Celery: Adds a crisp, fresh crunch to the soft filling.
White bread: Provides the soft structure that holds the filling together.