Name: Oyster Pie
Ingredients: Oysters; Sweetbread; ½ cup oyster liquor; ½ cup gravy; Slices of bread; 1 cup cream

Why it works: Oyster and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,545 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Oyster Pie

Ingredients

Directions

Open the oysters and separate them from the liquor, straining it.
Parboil the oysters after removing the gills.
Slice the sweetbread and parboil it as well.
In a deep dish, layer the oysters and sweetbread.
Add the oyster liquor and gravy to the layers.
Place slices of bread between the oysters and sweetbread.
If not using a crust, place bread on top.
Just before baking, pour in the cream.

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.

Oyster + breadtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,545 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,886 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Bread + creamtop 24% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together5,789 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).