Name: Mayonnaise Colorings
Ingredients: tomato pulp; mayonnaise; spinach; peas; parsley; coarse sea salt (formerly 'bay salt')

Why it works: Spinach and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,025 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Mayonnaise Colorings

Ingredients

Directions

Boil tomato pulp until thick, then mix into mayonnaise until the desired red color is achieved.
Cook spinach, peas, and parsley together, then press through a sieve and add to the mayonnaise for a green color.
For convenience, consider using harmless coloring pastes available for purchase.

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.

Spinach + parsleytop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,025 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Tomato + spinachtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,350 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
Spinach + peastop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together550 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
Tomato + parsleytop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,398 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Tomato + peastop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,058 recipes

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