Name: Sherry and Egg
Ingredients: 1 egg; 2 tablespoons sherry; ½ cup cold water; sugar to taste

Why it works: Egg and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 122,807 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Sherry and Egg

Ingredients

1 egg
2 tablespoons sherry
½ cup cold water
sugar to taste

Directions

Beat the egg with some sugar until slightly mixed.
Add the sherry and cold water.
Strain the mixture and serve.

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 + sugartop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together122,807 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Sherry + sugartop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,141 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Egg + sherrytop 29% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,324 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg: Provides protein and body, giving the drink a light, slightly thick texture.
Sherry: Adds aroma and a mildly sweet, fortified-wine flavour to the drink.

“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.