Name: To Roast Pheasants
Ingredients: fine raw oysters; coarse sea salt; nutmeg; 1 beaten egg yolk; thin slices of cold ham or bacon; butter; paper for wrapping

Why it works: Oyster and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,184 recipes. Both carry 2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, green. The science ↓

To Roast Pheasants

Ingredients

Directions

Chop the raw oysters, omitting the head part.
Mix the oysters with coarse sea salt, nutmeg, and the beaten egg yolk to bind the ingredients.
Cover the birds with thin slices of cold ham or bacon.
Wrap the birds in well-buttered sheets of paper.
Place the wrapped birds on a spit and roast them before a clear fire.

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.

Oyster + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,184 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
Oyster + hamtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together360 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Oyster + eggtop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,103 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Nutmeg + buttertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together24,377 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Ham + buttertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,475 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).