Name: Another Wat Op Breading- Chops and Cutlets
Ingredients: 1 egg; 2 teaspoons olive oil; 1 teaspoon water; a pinch of coarse sea salt; a pinch of pepper

Why it works: Olive and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 30,263 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Another Wat Op Breading- Chops and Cutlets

Ingredients

Directions

Make the egg mixture

Beat the egg well in a bowl.
Add olive oil, water, salt, and pepper to the egg and mix until combined.

Coat and fry

Dip the chop or cutlet in the mixture.
Fry the chop or cutlet as you would in the previous recipe.

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.

Olive + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together30,263 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Egg + olivetop 31% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,340 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Egg + peppertop 33% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together50,580 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Egg and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 50,580 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Egg: Binds the coating to the meat and helps it set and brown when fried.
Olive oil: Adds fat that carries flavour and helps the coating brown in the pan.

“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.