Name: Savoury Sauce for a Roasted Goose
Ingredients: 1 tablespoon made mustard; ½ teaspoon Cayenne pepper; 3 tablespoons port wine

Why it works: Mustard and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,430 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Savoury Sauce for a Roasted Goose

Ingredients

1 tablespoon made mustard
½ teaspoon Cayenne pepper
3 tablespoons port wine

Directions

Mix the mustard, Cayenne pepper, and port wine together.
Pour the hot mixture into the body of the goose through a slit in the apron just before serving.

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.

Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,430 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Mustard + port winetop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together314 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Pepper + port winetop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,804 recipes

Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

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

What each ingredient does

Made mustard: Adds sharp, pungent flavour that cuts through the rich goose fat.
Port wine: Adds sweetness and fruity depth that balances the sauce's heat.
Cayenne pepper: Adds gentle heat and a lingering warmth to the sauce.