Name: Hashed Mutton, with Herbs
Ingredients: 1 piece of butter; 1 shallot, finely minced; 1 tablespoon parsley, finely minced; ½ cup mushrooms, chopped; 1 tablespoon flour; ½ cup beef broth; Salt to taste

Why it works: Shallot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,737 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Hashed Mutton, with Herbs

Ingredients

Directions

In a casserole, melt the butter over low heat.
Add the minced shallot, parsley, and chopped mushrooms; cook gently.
Gradually mix in the flour and beef broth; stir until combined.
Let the mixture cool slightly, then add minced underdone mutton without boiling.

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.

Shallot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together3,737 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Shallot + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,982 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Mushroom + beeftop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,232 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).
Shallot + flourtop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,081 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together12,525 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

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

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, shallot, mushroom, flour, beef):

Capersfits better
Thymefits about as well
Tarragonfits about as well
Parsleythe original

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