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Salad

Celery, Mayonnaise

A chilled celery salad dressed with a homemade mayonnaise.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Celery, Mayonnaise

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mayonnaise

  1. Beat the egg yolks, mustard, salt, pepper, lemon juice, and a little water together.

  2. Slowly add the sweet oil drop by drop while continuing to beat the mixture.

  3. Add the boiling water to the mayonnaise and mix well.

Prepare and serve the salad

  1. Wash and wipe the celery, cut it into pieces, and place in a salad bowl.

  2. Pour the mayonnaise over the celery, mix well, and serve.

  3. To curl the celery, twist each branch around a skewer and place it in cold water.

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. Mustard + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Lemon + celerytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,467 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Mustard + peppertop 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

Egg yolks
Emulsify the oil into the mixture, giving the mayonnaise its thick, creamy body.
Sweet oil
Forms the bulk of the mayonnaise, adding richness and a smooth, creamy texture.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the mayonnaise and balances the richness of the oil.
Celery
Provides the crisp, fresh body of the salad that the mayonnaise coats.

The step that matters

Adding the oil slowly. Oil must be added drop by drop while beating so the egg yolk can emulsify it. Adding it too fast breaks the emulsion, and the mayonnaise separates and stays runny.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, pepper, lemon, celery):

  1. Spinachfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, pepper, lemon, celery. 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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