Name: Pancakes, with Minced Veal and Ham
Ingredients: 1 cup sour cream; 2 eggs; ¼ teaspoon salt; ½ teaspoon baking soda; water (as needed); flour (enough to roll into a dough); minced veal and ham (highly seasoned); frying fat

Why it works: Egg and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Pancakes, with Minced Veal and Ham

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the dough

In a bowl, mix sour cream, eggs, salt, baking soda, and enough water to create a batter.
Add flour gradually until a dough forms.
Roll the dough thin and cut into small rounds.

Fill and fry

Place a teaspoon of the minced veal and ham mixture on each round.
Wet the edges and cover with another round, pressing the edges tightly together.
Heat frying fat and drop the pancakes in, frying until golden brown.
Serve hot.

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.

Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together106,462 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Veal + hamtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,264 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Egg + hamtop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,526 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Cream + flourtop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together30,481 recipes

Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).
Cream + hamtop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,370 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Sour cream: Adds moisture and tang, keeping the dough tender and flavorful.
Eggs: Bind the batter and add structure to the dough.
Baking soda: Reacts with the acidic sour cream to lighten the dough slightly.
Flour: Forms the dough's structure once rolled and worked.
Minced veal and ham: Provides the savory, highly seasoned filling that flavors each pancake.

The step that matters

Pressing the edges tightly together. If the edges are not sealed well, the filling can leak out during frying, leaving the pancakes dry inside and greasy outside.

“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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Pancakes, with Minced Veal and Ham