Name: Stuffed Celery
Ingredients: large tender stalks of celery; grated cheese; ½ teaspoon lemon juice per teaspoon of cheese; dash of paprika; ribbon for tying

Why it works: Celery and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,467 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Stuffed Celery

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Scrape the celery stalks clean.
In a bowl, mix grated cheese with lemon juice and paprika.

Assemble

Fill the hollow space of two celery stalks with the cheese mixture.
Leave the freshest leaves at the top and tie with ribbon.

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.

Celery + lemontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together3,467 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Celery + cheesetop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together647 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).
Cheese + lemontop 29% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,154 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Celery stalks: Provide the crisp, hollow vessel that holds the filling.
Grated cheese: Forms the rich, savory filling that sets the flavor of the dish.
Lemon juice: Adds acidity that brightens the flavor of the rich cheese.