Name: Baked Stuffed Lamb
Ingredients: 1 very small whole lamb; 12 oz butter; 3 finely chopped onions; water

Why it works: Butter and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 42,912 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Baked Stuffed Lamb

Ingredients

1 very small whole lamb
12 oz butter
3 finely chopped onions
water

Directions

Remove the heart and liver from the lamb.
Place the lamb in a large saucepan and cover it with water.
Boil the lamb for 15 minutes.
Finely chop the heart and liver.
In a separate saucepan, melt the butter and add the chopped onions.

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.

Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together42,912 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Lamb + oniontop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,407 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).
Lamb + buttertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,232 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).