Name: Sausage Meat
Ingredients: 6 pounds lean, fresh pork; 3 pounds fat pork; 12 teaspoons powdered sage; 6 teaspoons black pepper; 6 teaspoons coarse sea salt

Why it works: Sage and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,388 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Sausage Meat

Ingredients

Directions

Grind the lean and fat pork together.
Add the powdered sage, black pepper, and coarse sea salt.
Mix well and pack into a jar for later use.

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.

Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,388 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Pork + sagetop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,527 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together22,121 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

What each ingredient does

Lean fresh pork: Provides the main lean meat, giving the sausage its body and bite.
Fat pork: Adds fat that keeps the meat moist and tender as it cooks.
Powdered sage: Adds the herbal, savoury aroma that defines classic sausage flavour.
Coarse sea salt: Seasons the meat and helps draw out proteins for a cohesive texture.