Why it works: Lettuce and beetroot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 678 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓
Chicken Salad
Ingredients
Directions
Trim the chicken and slice the lettuces after washing and drying them.
Place the lettuces in the middle of a dish and top with the chicken pieces.
Pour the salad dressing over the chicken.
Garnish the edge of the salad with hard-boiled eggs cut into rings, sliced cucumber, and boiled beetroot slices.
Alternatively, rub the yolks through a sieve and chop the whites finely, arranging them in small bunches on the salad.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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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Lettuce + beetroottop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together678 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
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Lettuce + cucumbertop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together1,409 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Cucumber + beetroottop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together345 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Chicken + lettucetop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,421 recipes
Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
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Chicken + cucumbertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,037 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Swap the beetroot
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, lettuce, cucumber, egg):
- Chivefits about as well
- Spinachfits about as well
- Mustardfits about as well
- Beetrootthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, lettuce, cucumber, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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