Why it works: Onion and biscuit work together. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 428 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓
Pork Pie
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Make the filling
In a pot, stew the pork pieces with the onion and bay leaves for 2 hours.
Remove the bay leaves and onion, then thicken the stew with flour.
Season with salt and pepper, and fill a large pan halfway with the mixture.
Bake
Cover with rich biscuit dough and bake at 400°F (200°C) for about 20 minutes.
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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Onion + biscuittop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together428 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
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Flour + biscuittop 9% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together889 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Pork + oniontop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,214 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together68,474 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Pepper + biscuittop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together841 recipes
Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Pork
- Long stewing breaks down connective tissue, leaving the meat tender and the broth rich.
- Flour
- Starch swells in the hot stew and thickens it into a spoonable filling.
- Rich biscuit dough
- Rises and browns in the oven to form a light, golden crust over the filling.
The step that matters
Thickening the stew with flour. Flour must be mixed in evenly and the stew kept hot so the starch swells and thickens. Added lumpy or too cold, it clumps and leaves raw flour taste and a thin, uneven filling.
Swap the onion
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, flour, pepper, biscuit):
- Arrowrootfits better
- Spinachfits better
- Turnipfits better
- Onionthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against pork, flour, pepper, biscuit. 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.
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