Name: Pork Meatballs with Tomato & Orange Sauce
Yield: Serves 6
Ingredients: 1 small onion , finely chopped; 2 garlic cloves , finely chopped; 2 small carrots , finely diced; olive oil; 2 sprigs thyme; 1 tsp sweet smoked paprika; 150ml dry white wine; 2 x 400g tins plum tomatoes , drained; 1 orange , zest and juice; 200ml chicken stock; oregano , to serve; 750g pork mince; 2 eggs; 3 garlic cloves , finely chopped; 1 small shallot , finely chopped; 1 tbsp ground cumin; 1 tbsp sweet smoked paprika; 2 tbsp oregano , chopped

Why it works: Onion and garlic match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 29,058 recipes. Both carry furaneol, which smells caramel, strawberry. The science ↓

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.

Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together29,058 recipes

Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).
Clove + thymetop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together4,108 recipes

Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
Garlic + olivetop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together25,665 recipes

Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).
Carrot + thymetop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together4,563 recipes

Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
Olive + thymetop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together4,948 recipes

Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (apple, fatty).

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

Swap the plum

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, garlic, clove, carrot, olive, thyme, white wine):

Limefits better
Lemonfits about as well
Avocadofits about as well
Plumthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, garlic, clove, carrot, olive, thyme, white wine. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Pork	100g cooked	242
Chicken	100g cooked	165
Olive Oil	1 tbsp (14g)	119
Egg	1 large egg (50g)	78
Orange	1 medium (131g)	62
Onion	1 medium (110g)	44
Plum	1 medium (66g)	30
Carrot	1 medium (61g)	25
Wine	2 tbsp cooking wine (30ml)	25
Tomato	1 medium (123g)	22
Cumin	1 tsp ground (2.1g)	8
Shallot	1 tbsp minced (10g)	7
Oregano	1 tsp dried (1.8g)	5
Garlic	1 clove (3g)	4
Thyme	1 tsp dried (1.4g)	4

Pork Meatballs with Tomato & Orange Sauce