Name: Pilau of Mutton
Ingredients: 1½ pounds mutton (from the neck), cut into slices; boiling water; 1 teaspoon salt; white pepper, to taste; 1 medium onion, chopped finely; ¾ cup rice; ½ pint tomato sauce

Why it works: Rice and tomato match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,065 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Pilau of Mutton

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the mutton

Cover the mutton slices with boiling water and boil rapidly for 2-3 minutes.
Reduce heat and simmer gently for about 45 minutes.
Add salt, white pepper, and chopped onion.

Add the rice and serve

Wash the rice and sprinkle it over the meat.
Simmer gently until the rice is tender, about 45 minutes.
Serve on a platter and cover with tomato sauce.

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.

Rice + tomatotop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together3,065 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Onion + tomatotop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,633 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Onion + ricetop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together10,433 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Tomato + saucetop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together5,469 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Mutton + ricetop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,019 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton: Provides the main meat and savory flavor as it simmers tender.
Rice: Absorbs cooking liquid and steams to a tender, fluffy texture.
Tomato sauce: Adds acidity and moisture to the finished dish.
Onion: Contributes sweetness and aroma as it cooks into the meat.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, onion, rice, tomato, sauce):

Garlicfits better
Cuminfits better
Capersfits better
White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, onion, rice, tomato, sauce. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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.