Name: Haricot Mutton
Ingredients: rough bits and trimmings of meat; pepper; salt; catsup; carrots; parsnips; onions; celery; mutton

Why it works: Carrot and parsnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,097 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Haricot Mutton

Ingredients

Directions

Boil the rough bits and trimmings to make a good gravy, seasoning with pepper, salt, and a little catsup.
Strain the gravy and add previously boiled carrots, parsnips, onions, and celery, sliced.
Season the mutton with pepper and salt, then broil it until brown.
Add the broiled mutton to the gravy along with the vegetables and stew for about 10 to 15 minutes.
Garnish with small pickles.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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.

Carrot + parsniptop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,097 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together10,173 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Parsnip + celerytop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together561 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together16,012 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Pepper + carrottop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together14,555 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, pepper, carrot, parsnip, celery, mutton):

Turnipfits better
Leekfits better
Capsicumfits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, pepper, carrot, parsnip, celery, mutton. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.