Name: Mashed Turnips
Ingredients: turnips; beef, mutton, or lamb (for boiling); pepper; coarse sea salt

Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Mashed Turnips

Ingredients

turnips
beef, mutton, or lamb (for boiling)
pepper
coarse sea salt

Directions

Pare the turnips and cut them in half.
Boil the turnips in a pot with beef, mutton, or lamb until tender.
Drain the liquid and mash the turnips with pepper and coarse sea salt.
Serve mashed or whole with white sauce.

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.

Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,971 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Turnip + peppertop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,252 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Turnip + beeftop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,940 recipes

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