Name: Mint Sauce
Ingredients: 1 handful of fresh green mint; 1 teaspoon of moist sugar; 3-4 tablespoons of vinegar

Why it works: Sugar and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 20,806 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Mint Sauce

Ingredients

1 handful of fresh green mint
1 teaspoon of moist sugar
3-4 tablespoons of vinegar

Directions

Pick the mint leaves from the stalks and chop them very finely.
In a serving dish, combine the chopped mint with the sugar and vinegar.
Serve this sauce with roast lamb, either hot or cold.

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.

Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,806 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Mint + vinegartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,376 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Mint + sugartop 32% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,592 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Fresh mint: Provides the main aroma and fresh herbal flavour of the sauce.
Moist sugar: Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with a touch of sweetness.
Vinegar: Adds acidity that brightens the sauce and sharpens the mint flavour.