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Pork, Prawn & Water Chestnut Dumplings

'Shu mai' are open-topped Chinese dumplings that work well steamed in bamboo as part of a dim sum platter

By bbcgoodfood · From Open Recipes · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Pork and water chestnut work together. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and 151 recipes mention both. Both carry 2-methylbutyraldehyde, which smells malty, chocolate. The science ↓

The recipe

Makes 25 dumplings

Ingredients

Contains: egg, soy, shellfish (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Step-by-step directions aren't available for this recipe. See the full recipe at the source →

By bbcgoodfood. Recipe from Open Recipes.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Pork + water chestnuttop 10% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together151 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  2. Garlic + oniontop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together29,030 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  3. Coriander + gingertop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together3,504 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  4. Garlic + coriandertop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together6,477 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Garlic + gingertop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together6,402 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

Flavor stand-ins for the coriander

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (garlic, ginger, pork, water chestnut, onion, egg, sauce):

  1. Corianderthe original
  2. Turmericabout as good a flavor fit

Fit is the average pairing score against garlic, ginger, pork, water chestnut, onion, egg, sauce. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).