Name: To Fry Ham
Ingredients: slices of ham; eggs; gravy

Why it works: Ham and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,526 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

To Fry Ham

Ingredients

slices of ham
eggs
gravy

Directions

Cut the ham into slices.
Fry the slices quickly in a pan until done.
Remove the ham and use the remaining gravy to fry the eggs.
Serve the fried eggs alongside the ham.

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.

Ham + eggtop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,526 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Ham: Provides the savory, meaty base of the dish and browns in the pan as it fries.
Eggs: Set in the hot pan to form a firm, tender protein that complements the ham.
Gravy: Remaining pan gravy adds moisture and flavor for frying the eggs.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.