Name: Chicken or Game Sandwiches
Ingredients: Slices of bread; Butter; Cold roast fowl or game; Lettuce leaves; Fillets of anchovies

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 ↓

Chicken or Game Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Cut slices of bread and butter.

Assemble and serve

Place very thin slices of cold roast fowl or game between two slices of bread.
Add shredded lettuce leaves and fillets of anchovies.
Dish on a napkin and serve.

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).

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

What each ingredient does

Bread: Provides the structure that holds the filling together.
Butter: Adds richness and moisture, and keeps the bread from soaking up the filling.
Roast fowl or game: Provides the main protein and savory body of the sandwich.
Lettuce: Adds cool crispness and moisture to contrast the rich filling.
Anchovies: Adds salty, savory depth that seasons the whole sandwich.