Name: Apple and Pork Stew
Prep time: 20 min
Cook time: 1 h
Yield: 4 servings
Ingredients: 2 tablespoons vegetable oil; 1 pound boneless pork shoulder, cubed; 1/4 cup all-purpose flour; 2 tablespoons butter; 1 red onion, diced; 2 cloves garlic, minced; 1 shallot, minced; 1 teaspoon dried thyme; 1 teaspoon dried rosemary; 2 teaspoons dried basil; 1 teaspoon salt; 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper; 1 pound new potatoes, cut into 1/2 -inch cubes; 2 cups dry red wine; 2 (14 ounce) cans beef broth; 1 large Granny Smith apple - peeled, cored and diced

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).
Shallot + thymetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,476 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Clove + thymetop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together4,108 recipes

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

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,608 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Garlic + shallottop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,000 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, flour, butter, onion, garlic, shallot, thyme):

Capersfits better
Parsleyfits better
Marjoramfits better
Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, flour, butter, onion, garlic, shallot, thyme. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Flour	1 cup (125g) all-purpose	455
Beef	100g cooked	250
Pork	100g cooked	242
Potato	1 medium (173g) baked	161
Olive Oil	1 tbsp (14g)	119
Butter	1 tbsp (14g)	102
Apple	1 medium (182g)	95
Onion	1 medium (110g)	44
Wine	2 tbsp cooking wine (30ml)	25
Shallot	1 tbsp minced (10g)	7
Black Pepper	1 tsp ground (2.3g)	6
Garlic	1 clove (3g)	4
Thyme	1 tsp dried (1.4g)	4
Rosemary	1 tsp dried (1.2g)	4
Basil	5 leaves fresh (2.5g)	1
Salt	1 tsp (6g)	0

Apple and Pork Stew