Name: Lettuce Sandwiches
Ingredients: Bread; Butter; Lettuce leaves; Mayonnaise dressing; Shredded lettuce

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Lettuce Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

Cut the bread into ¼ inch thick slices and butter them slightly.
Layer the buttered slices with delicate lettuce leaves, allowing the edges to extend beyond the bread.
Dress the lettuce with mayonnaise and sprinkle shredded lettuce on top.
Place another slice of bread on top and press gently together.
Cut the sandwiches into oblong diamond shapes and arrange them in piles on a bed of lettuce.

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.

Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Bread + lettucetop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together602 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Butter + lettucetop 25% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,287 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).