Name: Scalloped Roe
Ingredients: Roe; 1 egg yolk, beaten; Finely chopped parsley; Coarse sea salt, to taste; Black pepper, to taste; Lemon juice, to taste; White sauce (see recipe for white sauce); Bread crumbs; Butter

Why it works: Parsley and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Scalloped Roe

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

Boil the roe as you would for fried roe, then drain and break it up lightly with a fork.
In a baking dish, sprinkle a layer of roe, then add half the beaten egg yolk over the top.
Sprinkle with chopped parsley, season with salt, pepper, and a few drops of lemon juice.
Add a layer of white sauce on top.
Repeat the layers of roe, egg, seasoning, and sauce.
Cover with bread crumbs and bits of butter.
Bake until brown.

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.

Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together14,037 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together34,122 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together27,047 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Roe + saucetop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together142 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).