Why it works: Celery and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,033 recipes. Both carry nonanal, which smells fat, citrus. The science ↓
Celery Salad
Ingredients
Directions
Scrape and wash each celery stalk.
Soak the stalks in ice-cold water for 30 minutes.
Dry the stalks with a towel and cut them into ¼ inch pieces or 1 inch straws.
If cut into straws, soak them in ice water for 20 minutes to curl.
Mix the celery with French or mayonnaise dressing.
Garnish with lettuce leaves before serving.
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.
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Celery + lettucetop 4% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together2,033 recipes
Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
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