Name: Breast of Mutton
Ingredients: breast of mutton; cayenne pepper; black pepper; coarse sea salt; gherkin; 2 teaspoons mushroom ketchup

Why it works: Pepper and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,580 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Breast of Mutton

Ingredients

Directions

Stew the breast of mutton in gravy until tender.
Bone and score the meat, then season with cayenne, black pepper, and coarse sea salt.
Boil the mutton, skimming the fat from the gravy as it cooks.
Slice a few gherkins and add them along with 2 teaspoons of mushroom ketchup to the gravy.
Boil the gravy and pour it over the mutton when serving.

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.

Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together13,580 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Mutton + mushroomtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together685 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
Mutton + peppertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together5,442 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Mushroom + ketchuptop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,225 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Mutton + ketchuptop 24% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together367 recipes

Shared aroma: decanoic acid (soapy, waxy).