Name: Game and Gravy
Ingredients: remains of game; ½ cup madeira or good golden sherry; 1 ounce butter; stale bread-crumbs

Why it works: Butter and bread 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 ↓

Game and Gravy

Ingredients

remains of game
½ cup madeira or good golden sherry
1 ounce butter
stale bread-crumbs

Directions

Soak the remains of the game in gravy for about 15 minutes without boiling.
Add the madeira or sherry to the gravy.
In an enamelled stew-pan, melt the butter.
Add the stale bread-crumbs to the butter and stir until they begin to change color.
Remove the pan from the heat but continue stirring until the crumbs are brown.
Place the browned crumbs on blotting paper to absorb excess grease.
Keep the crumbs warm in the oven before serving, but do not overheat.

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.

Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Sherry + buttertop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,505 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
Sherry + breadtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together682 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).