Why it works: Onion and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,259 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓
To Boil Tripe
Ingredients
Directions
Wash the tripe well in warm water and trim off all the fat.
Cut the tripe into small pieces and boil it in enough water to cover it for five hours.
After four hours, pour off the water, season the tripe with pepper and coarse sea salt.
Put the tripe into a pot with equal parts milk and water and boil for one hour.
Boil ten or a dozen onions until soft, then drain and mash them.
In a clean saucepan, combine the mashed onions with a bit of butter rolled in flour and a splash of cream or milk.
Let the mixture boil, then add it to the tripe just before serving.
Serve with pepper, vinegar, and mustard.
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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Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together9,259 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together14,067 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together15,430 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 (pepper, milk, butter, flour, cream, vinegar, mustard):
- Horseradishfits better
- Shallotfits better
- Potatofits better
- Onionthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, milk, butter, flour, cream, vinegar, mustard. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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