Name: Stewed Duck with Peas
Ingredients: 1 cold duck, cut up; 1 onion, chopped; Slices of ham or bacon; Parsley, for garnish; 1 tablespoon butter; 3 cups stock; 2 cups peas (or diced turnips if peas are unavailable); 1 ounce flour

Why it works: Onion and parsley are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 25,843 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Stewed Duck with Peas

Ingredients

Directions

In a large pot, brown the cut-up duck and ham in the butter.
Mix the flour with the remaining butter, melt it, and stir in the stock.
Add seasoning and the browned duck; stew gently for 30 minutes.
Add the peas (or turnips) and stew again for 15 minutes until tender.
Garnish with fried bread cut into neat shapes.

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.

Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together25,843 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Parsley + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together16,675 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Parsley + peastop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,885 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Onion + peastop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,460 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, ham, parsley, butter, flour):

Lentilsfits better
Black-eyed peafits better
Chickpeafits better
Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, ham, parsley, butter, flour. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.