Name: Corned Beef with Vegetables
Ingredients: 1 head of cabbage; 2 quarts boiling water; carrots; 2 bananas; 2 teaspoons sugar; ¼ cup water

Why it works: Cabbage and carrot are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,505 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Corned Beef with Vegetables

Ingredients

Directions

Remove the outer leaves from the cabbage and soak it in water with 1 teaspoon of baking soda until effervescent.
Drain the cabbage and pour 2 quarts of boiling water over it.
Press out the water and serve the cabbage with halved carrots around the corned beef.
For the banana puree, pass 2 bananas through a ricer, add 2 teaspoons of sugar and ¼ cup of water.
Simmer the mixture until thick, then pour over the bananas in cups. Serve with or without whipped cream.

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.

Cabbage + carrottop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,505 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Carrot + bananatop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together135 recipes

Shared aroma: hexyl acetate (fruity, apple).
Banana + sugartop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,102 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
Cabbage + bananatop 23% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Carrot + sugartop 28% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,211 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).