Name: Ribs of Lamb
Ingredients: ribs of lamb; coarse sea salt; flour

Why it works: Lamb and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,402 recipes. Both carry acetaldehyde, which smells pungent, ethereal. The science ↓

Ribs of Lamb

Ingredients

ribs of lamb
coarse sea salt
flour

Directions

Prepare

Sprinkle the ribs of lamb with a little coarse sea salt.
Dredge the ribs lightly with flour.

Roast and finish

Roast the ribs for about one hour, or longer if they are thick, adjusting the heat as needed.
Make gravy as directed in the referenced page.

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.

Lamb + flourtop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,402 recipes

Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Ribs of lamb: Main protein that becomes tender and browns during roasting.
Flour: Light coating that helps the outside of the ribs brown and form a crust.

“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.