Why it works: Scallop and pepper work together. They rank in the top 26% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 154 recipes. Both carry nonanal, which smells fat, citrus. The science ↓
Fried Scallops
Ingredients
Directions
Pick over and wash the scallops quickly, then drain them between towels.
Season the cracker crumbs with salt and pepper.
Dip the scallops in the seasoned crumbs, then in the beaten egg, and again in the crumbs.
Fry the scallops in smoking hot fat and serve immediately.
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.
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Scallop + peppertop 26% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together154 recipes
Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
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Scallop + eggtop 28% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together90 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
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Pepper + eggtop 33% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together50,580 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Pepper and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 50,580 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
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