Name: Cucumbers Stuffed
Ingredients: cucumbers; finely minced fowl; finely minced veal; finely minced mutton

Why it works: Veal and mutton are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,394 recipes. Both carry 1-nonanal, which smells fatty, waxy. The science ↓

Cucumbers Stuffed

Ingredients

cucumbers
finely minced fowl
finely minced veal
finely minced mutton

Directions

Remove the seeds from the cucumbers using a marrow spoon or by cutting them with a knife while turning it.
Fill the cucumbers with a mixture of finely minced fowl, veal, or mutton.

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.

Veal + muttontop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,394 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-nonanal (fatty, waxy).
Cucumber + vealtop 23% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together439 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
Cucumber + muttontop 26% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together202 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).