Name: Club House Sandwiches
Ingredients: thin slices of brown or white bread; butter; thin slices of crisp fried bacon; thin slices of chicken, well seasoned; thin layer of cucumber pickle, sliced crosswise

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Club House Sandwiches

Ingredients

thin slices of brown or white bread
butter
thin slices of crisp fried bacon
thin slices of chicken, well seasoned
thin layer of cucumber pickle, sliced crosswise

Directions

Prepare the toast

Toast the slices of bread until golden.
Lightly butter one side of each slice.

Assemble

Layer bacon on one slice of buttered toast.
Add a second slice of toast.
Layer seasoned chicken.
Top with another slice of buttered toast.
Add a layer of cucumber pickle.
Finish with a final slice of buttered toast.

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.

Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Bread + chickentop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,258 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity).
Butter + chickentop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together13,902 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
Bread + cucumbertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together344 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Chicken + cucumbertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,037 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Bread: Provides the crisp, golden structure that holds the stacked layers together.
Butter: Adds fat and richness to the toast and helps keep the bread from soaking up moisture.
Bacon: Contributes salty, smoky flavour and crisp texture to the sandwich.
Chicken: Supplies the savoury, substantial protein layer of the sandwich.
Cucumber pickle: Adds acidity and a crisp, tangy contrast to the rich layers.