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Macaroni and Rice

A savory dish of rice and macaroni cooked with onion, meat, currants, cheese, and stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Rice and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,433 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Macaroni and Rice

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the rice

  1. Heat the fat in a pan until hot and bubbling.

  2. Add the rice and fry until it turns a deep yellow, stirring constantly.

  3. Drain the fat from the rice and transfer it to the boiling stock.

  4. Add salt and pepper, and simmer until the stock is absorbed by the rice.

Prepare the filling

  1. Slice the onion and fry it in the remaining fat.

  2. Add the meat and fry briefly.

Combine and serve

  1. Combine the onion, meat, rice, currants, and cheese.

  2. Serve hot in a small pie dish.

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.

  1. Rice + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,433 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  3. Rice + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,379 recipes

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

  4. Rice + meattop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Rice + cheesetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together942 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Rice
Forms the bulk of the dish and absorbs the stock as it simmers, setting the texture.
Fat
Carries heat for frying and coats the rice grains, helping them turn golden and stay separate.
Meat
Adds savory flavor and substance to the filling when browned briefly in fat.
Cheese
Melts into the hot rice and adds richness and savory flavor.
Onion
Softens and sweetens in the fat, adding aroma and depth to the filling.

The step that matters

Simmering the rice in stock. Rice must absorb the stock gradually over low heat. Too much heat or too little liquid can leave it scorched or unevenly cooked, so watch it until the stock is fully absorbed.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, onion, meat, cheese, pepper):

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Limefits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, onion, meat, cheese, pepper. 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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