Name: Fried Smelts with Lemon Sauce
Ingredients: smelts; salt; pepper; flour; cottolene or other fat

Why it works: Smelt and flour work together. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 164 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Fried Smelts with Lemon Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Clean, wash, and dry the smelts.
Roll the smelts in salted and peppered flour.
Place the smelts in a cold place for 1 hour to firm up.
Fry the smelts in deep cottolene or other fat until light brown.
Drain the fried smelts in a hot colander to remove excess grease.
Serve in a hot dish.

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.

Smelt + flourtop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together164 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together50,459 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Smelt + peppertop 33% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together175 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).