Name: Stewed Eels
Ingredients: eels, cut into small pieces; small mushrooms; black pepper; coarse sea salt; 1 pint white wine

Why it works: Mushroom and white wine are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,765 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity. The science ↓

Stewed Eels

Ingredients

Directions

Place the cut eels in a stewpan with mushrooms, black pepper, coarse sea salt, and white wine.
Stew gently for 30 minutes.

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.

Mushroom + white winetop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,765 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity).
Mushroom + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together13,580 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Pepper + white winetop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,433 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).