Name: Mutton Pies
Ingredients: 7 ounces of cooked meat; 2 tablespoons strong gravy; a little pepper; a little salt; a few drops essence of anchovy; 1 dessert spoon chopped parsley; good short crust pastry; 1 egg for glazing

Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Mutton Pies

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

Mix the meat, gravy, pepper, salt, essence of anchovy, and parsley thoroughly.

Assemble the pies

Line tartlet or patty pans with short crust pastry.
Fill the pans with the prepared meat mixture and cover with pastry. Decorate the tops.

Glaze, bake and serve

Brush with beaten egg.
Bake at 400°F (200°C) for 20 to 30 minutes.
Serve hot on a dish covered with a napkin.

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 + parsleytop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together34,122 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Anchovy + eggtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,330 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Meat + anchovytop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together335 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
Anchovy + parsleytop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,702 recipes

Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).
Pepper + anchovytop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,232 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Cooked meat: Forms the bulk of the filling and provides the savoury flavour of the pie.
Strong gravy: Adds moisture and savoury depth so the filling does not dry out in the oven.
Egg: Beaten egg brushed on the pastry gives a glossy, golden browned surface.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.