Name: Pumpkin, Baked
Ingredients: 1 nice rich pumpkin; coarse sea salt; black pepper; butter; water

Why it works: Pumpkin and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 20% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,933 recipes. Both carry 2,3-pentanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Pumpkin, Baked

Oven, in the book's wordsA sharp oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a sharp oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).
Pare and seed the pumpkin, then slice it into pieces about ¼ inch thick.
Soak the pumpkin slices in cold water with a little salt for a while, then dry them.
Layer the pumpkin slices in a large, shallow baking dish, adding just enough water to prevent burning.
Bake until the pumpkin is very tender and the moisture is dried up.
Season with salt and pepper, and spread butter on both sides before serving.

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.

Pumpkin + buttertop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,933 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).
Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together85,593 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Pumpkin + peppertop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,650 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).