Name: A Richer Variety of Minced Collops
Ingredients: cayenne pepper; ¼ teaspoon pounded mace; beef gravy; ¼ cup mushroom catsup; ¾ cup port wine; forcemeat balls; fried sippets; currant jelly

Why it works: Beef and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,232 recipes. Both carry 2,4-nonadienal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

A Richer Variety of Minced Collops

Ingredients

Directions

Omit minced herbs from the thickening.
Season with cayenne and pounded mace.
Substitute beef gravy for boiling water.
When collops are nearly done, mix mushroom catsup and port wine.
Stir this mixture into the meat.
Serve collops very hot, garnished with forcemeat balls and fried sippets.
For extra flavor, use gravy from roast hare bones and serve with currant jelly.

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.

Beef + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,232 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).
Port wine + curranttop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together356 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Pepper + beeftop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,971 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Mushroom + port winetop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together570 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together13,580 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, mace, beef, mushroom, port wine):

Figfits better
Plumfits better
Lemonfits better
Currantthe original

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