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Salad

Egg or Fish Salad

A layered salad of sliced potatoes, hard‑boiled eggs, onion, and a creamy dressing, optionally topped with cold fish flakes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Egg or Fish Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Layer the salad

  1. Layer sliced potatoes in a glass bowl or salad dish.

  2. Add a layer of sliced hard-boiled eggs on top.

  3. Sprinkle chopped onion, salt, and pepper over the layers.

Make the dressing

  1. In a bowl, combine the raw egg yolk and mustard.

  2. Slowly beat in the heavy cream, drop by drop.

  3. Add vinegar and fold in the beaten egg white.

Finish and serve

  1. Pour the dressing over the salad before serving.

  2. For a fish salad, substitute or add flakes of cold boiled fish.

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.

  1. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Potato + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,340 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Form the bulk of the layers and give the salad its body.
Hard-boiled eggs
Add a firm, mild layer that gives the salad its egg flavor and substance.
Raw egg yolk
Emulsifies with the cream and mustard so the dressing thickens smoothly.
Heavy cream
Adds richness and fat, giving the dressing a smooth, creamy texture.
Egg white
Beaten to stiff peaks, it lightens the dressing and adds airy volume.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the rich cream and egg flavors.

The step that matters

Beat the cream into the yolk drop by drop. Adding cream slowly lets the yolk emulsify it gradually. Pouring too fast can cause the dressing to split or stay thin and oily.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, egg, pepper, mustard, cream, vinegar, salmon):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, egg, pepper, mustard, cream, vinegar, salmon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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