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 ↓
Savoury Pickled Walnut
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the mixture
Soak the bread in the milk.
Add the parsley, herbs, onion, eggs, and seasoning to the soaked bread.
Mash the pickled walnuts.
Dissolve part of the butter in a pan and add it along with the mashed walnuts to the mixture; mix well.
Bake
Butter a pie dish with the remaining butter, pour in the mixture, and bake.
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.
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Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Walnut + parsleytop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together865 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together25,843 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Bread + milktop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together11,466 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Eggs
- Bind the mixture and help it set into a firm, sliceable loaf when baked.
- Allinson bread
- Provides the soft base that soaks up the milk and gives the loaf its body.
- Milk
- Softens the bread and adds moisture so the mixture bakes tender.
- Pickled walnuts
- Add the sharp, savoury, tangy flavour that defines the dish.
- Butter
- Adds richness and fat, carrying flavour and helping the top brown.
Swap the onion
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, milk, egg, walnut, vinegar, parsley, butter):
- Shallotfits better
- Capsicumfits better
- Chivefits better
- Onionthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against bread, milk, egg, walnut, vinegar, parsley, butter. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
“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.
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