Why it works: Rhubarb and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,852 recipes. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓
Rhubarb Tart
Ingredients
Directions
Remove the thin skin from the rhubarb stalks and cut them into 4 to 5-inch pieces.
Place the rhubarb in a dish and pour over a thin syrup made from sugar and water.
Cover with another dish and simmer slowly for 1 hour on a hot hearth or in a block tin saucepan.
Allow the mixture to cool, then make it into a tart.
Bake the tart until the crust is golden and the filling is tender.
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.
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Rhubarb + sugartop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,852 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
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