Oyvind leads me to this: Foodpairing.

The story:

– FOODPAIRING –
“Food combines with each other when they have major flavour components in common.”

A list was made of 250 food products each with their major flavour components. By comparing the flavour of each food product eg strawberry with the rest of the food and their flavours, new combinations like strawberry with peas can be made. The way to use is, is just to select a food product like strawberries. You will get a plot where you have strawberry in the middle surrounded by other food products. Take one of those other food products and try to make a new recipe by combining those two. The more flavours food products have in common the shorter the distance between the food products.

– FOOD IS INTERCHANGEABLE –
A food product has a specific flavour because of a combination of different flavours. Like basil taste like basil because of the combination of linalool, estragol, …. So if I want to reconstruct the basil flavour without using any basil, you have to search for a combination of other food products where one contains linalool (like coriander), one contains estragol (like tarragon),… So I can reconstruct basil by combining coriander, tarragon, cloves, laurel. The way to use it is to take from each branch of the plot one product and make a combination of those food products.

Wonderful. I need to leave. For the kitchen. Experiments. Lots of experiments.

More food on eirikso:
The pepper matters
How to roast your own coffee
Good American sparkling wine
Make your own mustard with chili and honey