Name: Ham
Ingredients: 1 good ham, well soaked; 2-3 cloves; Madeira wine; Egg, for glazing; Bread crumbs; Butter; Sauce Espagnole with Madeira wine

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Ham

Ingredients

Directions

Cut off the skin of the soaked ham and spit it.
Insert 2-3 cloves into the shank.
Rub the ham with Madeira wine and prick the underside with a knife.
Cover the ham with a paste, then with paper, and tie it up.
Once cooked, remove the paste and quickly rub the ham with egg.
Sprinkle bread crumbs over the ham and baste with butter.
Continue sprinkling crumbs until a crust forms and it turns brown.
Place the ham on a dish, garnish the bone with paper, and pour Sauce Espagnole with Madeira underneath.

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.

Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Ham + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,536 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together22,662 recipes

Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together15,338 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Ham + buttertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,475 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, madeira wine, egg, bread, butter, sauce):

Capersfits better
Nutmegfits better
Parsleyfits better
Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, madeira wine, egg, bread, butter, sauce. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.