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Sandwich Paste

A savory spread made from chopped ham, egg, pickle, olives, green onions, mustard, and red pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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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 ↓

Sandwich Paste

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Chop the boiled ham, hard boiled egg, German pickle, stuffed olives, and green onions very fine.

  2. Mix in the Heinz's mustard and a dash of red pepper.

  3. Spread the mixture on bread to make sandwiches.

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.

  1. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Olive + mustardtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Olive + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 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

Boiled ham
Adds savoury, meaty flavour and a chewy bite to the spread.
Hard boiled egg
Provides the main body and a soft, creamy texture to the filling.
German pickle
Adds acidity and a crisp tang that cuts through the rich egg.
Stuffed olives
Contribute briny saltiness and a sharp, savoury note.
Green onions
Add a fresh, sharp aroma and mild bite.
Heinz's mustard
Adds pungent sharpness that brightens the flavour of the egg and ham.

The step that matters

Chop everything very fine. Fine chopping gives the filling an even, spreadable texture and distributes the strong flavours of pickle, onion and olive evenly, so no single bite overpowers the others.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, egg, olive, mustard, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Lettucefits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, egg, olive, mustard, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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