Name: Ham Sandwiches
Ingredients: lean ham; mayonnaise; fed pepper; celery

Why it works: Pepper and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Ham Sandwiches

Ingredients

lean ham
mayonnaise
fed pepper
celery

Directions

Chop the lean ham finely.
Mix the chopped ham with mayonnaise.
Season with fed pepper and finely chopped celery.

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.

Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together16,012 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Ham + celerytop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,608 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).
Ham + peppertop 23% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together6,058 recipes

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