Name: Corn with Green Peppers
Ingredients: 1 can of corn; 1 green pepper, sliced thin; salt to taste; ½ pint thick cream

Why it works: Corn and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,324 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Corn with Green Peppers

Ingredients

1 can of corn
1 green pepper, sliced thin
salt to taste
½ pint thick cream

Directions

Mix and season

Mix the corn and sliced green pepper in a bowl.
Add salt to taste.
Stir in the thick cream.

Cook and serve

Place the mixture in a cooking bag.
Cook for 20 minutes.
Serve warm.

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.

Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,324 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Pepper + creamtop 23% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together21,449 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Corn + creamtop 25% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,532 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

Pepper and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 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

Corn: Forms the bulk of the dish and adds natural sweetness.
Green pepper: Adds a fresh, slightly sharp flavour and some tender texture as it cooks.
Thick cream: Adds fat and richness, giving the dish its smooth, creamy body.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.