Name: Pickle the Fresh Herrings
Ingredients: Fresh herrings; Pepper; Coarse sea salt; Mustard; Nutmeg; ½ pint vinegar

Why it works: Pepper and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,015 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Pickle the Fresh Herrings

Ingredients

Directions

Cut off the heads and tails of the fish.
Scrape and wash them well.
Split each herring in half and remove the bones.
Rub each half with pepper, coarse sea salt, and mustard.
Grate a small quantity of nutmeg on each half.
Pack the halves in a stone jar that holds about 3 pounds.
Pound the soft roes of the fish and mix with ½ pint of vinegar.

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.

Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together13,015 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together14,067 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Mustard + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,019 recipes

Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).
Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,814 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).