Name: Baked Lentils with Rice
Ingredients: 2 cups lentils; 1 small onion; 1 pint cold water; 2 cloves; 1 tablespoon lemon juice; 1 cup cooked rice; Breadcrumbs; Butter or margarine; Parsley

Why it works: Lemon and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Baked Lentils with Rice

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the lentils

Wash and pick over the lentils.
Place the lentils in a saucepan with cold water.
Let them soak for 5 to 6 hours or overnight.
Add lemon juice, onion, and cloves to the lentils.
Cook slowly until the lentils are soft, about 30 minutes.
Remove the onion and cloves.

Bake and serve

Combine the lentils with the cooked rice in a greased baking dish.
Cover the mixture with a layer of breadcrumbs.
Dot with butter or margarine.
Sprinkle with parsley.
Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until the breadcrumbs are brown.

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.

Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together14,037 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Lentils + parsleytop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together322 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Clove + parsleytop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together6,768 recipes

Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
Lentils + clovetop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together210 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Lentils + oniontop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,221 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Lentils: Form the main body of the dish and give it a soft, hearty texture when cooked.
Cooked rice: Adds bulk and a lighter, fluffier texture that mixes with the soft lentils.
Breadcrumbs: Form a top layer that browns in the oven for a crisp, golden surface.
Butter or margarine: Adds fat that helps the breadcrumbs brown and gives a richer flavour.
Lemon juice: Adds acidity that brightens the mild, earthy flavour of the lentils.

The step that matters

Cook the lentils until soft. Lentils must be fully tender before baking, because the oven only browns the top and will not soften firm lentils.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lentils, clove, lemon, rice, butter, parsley):

Shallotfits better
Leekfits better
Okrafits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lentils, clove, lemon, rice, butter, parsley. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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.