Name: Venison Ham
Ingredients: equal parts coarse sea salt; equal parts brown sugar; equal parts fine salt; equal parts molasses; 1 teaspoon saltpetre; cider vinegar; bran; brown paper; muslin cover

Why it works: Cider and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,431 recipes. Both carry 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol, which smells smoky, clove. The science ↓

Venison Ham

Ingredients

Directions

Mix coarse sea salt and brown sugar in equal proportions and rub into the hams.
Pack hams in a cask, sprinkling dry salt between them, and let them sit for eight days, rubbing with dry salt and sugar daily.
Mix fine salt, molasses, and saltpetre for every two hams.
Remove hams from the pickle and brush with cider vinegar, then coat with the new mixture.
Empty the cask, wash it with cold water, and repack the hams, sprinkling fine salt over each.
Let hams sit for another eight days.
Wash off the pickle with tepid water until salt crystals are removed, then sponge with vinegar and powder with bran while wet.
Smoke the hams for two weeks, or three weeks if large.
Wrap in unscented brown paper, stitch a muslin cover over it, and whitewash unless using immediately.
Chip or shave for serving.

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.

Cider + vinegartop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,431 recipes

Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).
Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,225 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,806 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Molasses + cidertop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together470 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Molasses + vinegartop 26% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,253 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).