Name: To Dress Red Herrings
Ingredients: fine large red herrings; boiling small beer; nice dripping; mashed potatoes; sweet oil; egg sauce (optional)

Why it works: Beer and potato work together. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 145 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

To Dress Red Herrings

Ingredients

Directions

Cut the fish open and soak them in boiling small beer for 30 minutes.
Drain the fish and heat them in a Dutch oven.
Rub nice dripping over the fish.
Serve the fish on a bed of mashed potatoes.
Drizzle a few drops of sweet oil over the hot fish for added flavor.
Serve with egg sauce if desired.

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.

Beer + potatotop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together145 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
Potato + saucetop 25% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,073 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Potato + eggtop 29% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,978 recipes

Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
Beer + saucetop 29% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together236 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Beer + eggtop 33% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together464 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).