Name: Poached Eggs on Toast
Ingredients: slices of whole meal or rye bread; eggs; parsley or cress for garnish

Why it works: Rye and parsley share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 31 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Poached Eggs on Toast

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

slices of whole meal or rye bread
eggs
parsley or cress for garnish

Directions

Toast the bread slices in a 350°F (175°C) oven until golden brown.
While hot, dip the toast into boiling water for a few seconds, then remove quickly.
Arrange the toast on a large dish.
Poach the eggs in water at 132°F to 160°F until a film forms over the yolk and the white is set.
Remove the poached eggs from the water and place one on each piece of toast.
Garnish with parsley or cress and serve hot.

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.

Rye + parsleytop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together31 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Egg + parsleytop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,765 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Rye + eggtop 32% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together484 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).