Name: Chicken Pudding
Ingredients: 1 small chicken; Beef suet paste (enough to line a basin); Thin slices of chorissa or smoked veal; Beef gravy (enough to cover chicken); Mushroom essence or powder; Pepper to taste; Coarse sea salt to taste; A pinch of nutmeg; A pinch of mace

Why it works: Nutmeg and mace are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Chicken Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Line a basin with beef suet paste.
Cut up the chicken and lightly fry the pieces.
Place the chicken in a stew-pan with chorissa or smoked veal.
Add enough beef gravy to cover the chicken.
Season with mushroom essence, pepper, coarse sea salt, nutmeg, and mace.
Simmer gently for 15 minutes.
Fill the pudding with the chicken mixture and pour some gravy over it.
Cover the pudding tightly with the paste, wetting the edges to seal.

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.

Nutmeg + macetop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,557 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Chicken + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,172 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-butyl acetate (fruity, banana).
Chicken + beeftop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,148 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
Beef + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,232 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).
Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together13,015 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, beef, veal, mushroom, pepper, nutmeg):

Marjoramfits better
Thymefits better
Rosemaryfits better
Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, beef, veal, mushroom, pepper, nutmeg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.