Name: Potatoes and Onions
Ingredients: potatoes; onions; salt; water; ham gravy or butter; vinegar

Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Potatoes and Onions

Ingredients

Directions

Boil the potatoes in their skins until tender. Peel while hot and slice them.
Slice the onions and let them stand in salt water for about an hour.
In a skillet, cook the onions with a little ham gravy or butter and a little water until slightly softened.
In a vegetable dish, layer the onions and potatoes alternately, finishing with a layer of potatoes on top.
Add 1 cup of vinegar to the skillet with the ham gravy or butter, warm it, and pour over the layered dish.

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.

Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,023 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Onion + vinegartop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,226 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Onion + hamtop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,159 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).
Potato + vinegartop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,608 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Ham + vinegartop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together737 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-methylbutanol (malty, whiskey).