Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
Podovies, or Beef Patties
Ingredients
Directions
Shred the underdone beef and mix with fat, pepper, coarse sea salt, and finely chopped shallot or onion.
Make a plain dough with butter, egg, and milk, then roll it thin.
Cut the dough into shapes like apple puffs and fill with the beef mixture.
Pinch the edges to seal and fry until golden brown.
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.
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,971 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Pepper + shallottop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,898 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Beef + milktop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,759 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).
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Beef + shallottop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,103 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Swap the shallot
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, pepper, butter, egg, milk):
- Potatofits better
- Capsicumfits better
- Asparagusfits better
- Shallotthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper, butter, egg, milk. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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