Name: Orange Salad
Ingredients: 6 oranges; ½ lb. of raisins; 2 oz. of powdered sugar; 4 tablespoons of brandy

Why it works: Raisin and brandy are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,768 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Orange Salad

Ingredients

6 oranges
½ lb. of raisins
2 oz. of powdered sugar
4 tablespoons of brandy

Directions

Prepare the oranges

Peel 5 of the oranges and slice them without breaking the pulp.
Arrange the slices on a glass dish.

Make the raisin topping

Stone the raisins and mix them with the sugar and brandy.
Combine the raisin mixture with the oranges.

Finish and serve

Squeeze the juice of the remaining orange over the dish 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.

Raisin + brandytop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,768 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Orange + raisintop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,684 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Raisin + sugartop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together12,481 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Orange + brandytop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,706 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Sugar + brandytop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together11,939 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and brandy barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 11,939 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

Oranges: Provide the fresh fruit base, with juice that adds moisture and bright acidity.
Raisins: Add concentrated sweetness and chewy texture against the soft orange slices.
Powdered sugar: Dissolves easily into the raisin mixture and the orange juice, adding sweetness.
Brandy: Adds a boozy aroma and flavor that brightens the fruit and raisins.