Name: Anchovy Sandwiches
Ingredients: 1 small bottle anchovies; 2 tablespoons mayonnaise; 2 hard boiled eggs; 4 dozen champion biscuits; 2 tablespoons minced celery; 1 pinch cayenne pepper

Why it works: Celery and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Anchovy Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

Chop the celery, anchovies, and hard boiled eggs very finely.
Mix the chopped ingredients with mayonnaise and cayenne pepper.
Spread the mixture between the biscuits.

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 + peppertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together16,012 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Biscuit + celerytop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together150 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Biscuit + peppertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together841 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Egg + biscuittop 27% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,643 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Egg + peppertop 33% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together50,580 recipes

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

Egg and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 50,580 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Anchovies: Provide the salty, savory flavor that defines the filling.
Hard boiled eggs: Add soft, creamy body and mild richness to the filling.
Mayonnaise: Binds the chopped ingredients together and adds moisture and fat.
Champion biscuits: Serve as the crisp, dry base that holds the filling between them.