Name: Meat Puddings and Pies
Ingredients: suet (or equal parts butter and lard); meat, cut into 3-inch by ½-inch pieces; pepper; coarse sea salt; hard-boiled eggs; pastry for crust

Why it works: Butter and meat are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,594 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Meat Puddings and Pies

Ingredients

Directions

Make a suet crust or use equal parts butter and lard.
Butter a basin well and line it with pastry, reserving some for the cover.
Layer the meat pieces in the basin, seasoning each layer with pepper and salt.
For boiling, cover with pastry, pinch the edges, and tie a cloth over the top. Boil for 2 to 2¼ hours.
For baking, place a thin layer of pastry around the edge of the dish, then add the meat, seasoning, and slices of hard-boiled eggs.
Cover with pastry and make a small hole in the top. Crimp the edges with the back of a knife.

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 + meattop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,594 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together118,967 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Meat + peppertop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together8,777 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together85,593 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Meat + eggtop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,432 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).