Name: Asparagus Salad, with Truffles, Royal
Ingredients: Asparagus (quantity as needed); Truffles (½ quantity of asparagus, cut into short Julienne); Salt (to taste); Pepper (to taste); Juice of 1 lemon; Hard-boiled eggs (finely chopped, yolks and whites separated); Reduced cold Madeira wine sauce (for dipping truffle slices); Tartare sauce (for filling)

Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Asparagus Salad, with Truffles, Royal

Ingredients

Asparagus (quantity as needed)
Truffles (½ quantity of asparagus, cut into short Julienne)
Salt (to taste)
Pepper (to taste)
Juice of 1 lemon
Hard-boiled eggs (finely chopped, yolks and whites separated)
Reduced cold Madeira wine sauce (for dipping truffle slices)
Tartare sauce (for filling)

Directions

Prepare the asparagus as directed in recipe No. 78.
Add half the quantity of truffles, cut into short Julienne.
Season with salt and pepper, then add the juice of one lemon.
Mix gently, cover, and set in a cool place for one hour.
When ready to serve, garnish the salad with alternating layers of chopped egg yolks and whites around the border.
Add slices of truffles dipped in reduced cold Madeira wine sauce.
Make a crown in the center and fill it with Tartare sauce.

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.

Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together27,047 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Asparagus + lemontop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together704 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Asparagus + peppertop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,968 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Asparagus + truffletop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together141 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).
Truffle + madeira winetop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together195 recipes