Name: Cheese Salad, or Mock Crab
Ingredients: 1 pound old cheese, grated; 1 hard-boiled egg; 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper; 1 teaspoon salt; 1 teaspoon white sugar; 1 teaspoon made mustard; 1 tablespoon onion vinegar; 1 teaspoon salad oil

Why it works: Mustard and onion match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,259 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Cheese Salad, or Mock Crab

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dressing

Rub the yolk of the hard-boiled egg into a paste with the salad oil.
Add the salt, cayenne pepper, sugar, and mustard in order, mixing well.

Assemble and serve

Finally, incorporate the grated cheese before adding the onion vinegar.
Serve in a crab shell or bowl.
This salad pairs well with crackers and butter.

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.

Mustard + oniontop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together9,259 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together14,067 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,430 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Cheese + mustardtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,805 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together68,474 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

Old cheese: Provides the bulk and rich, savory flavor that stands in for crab meat.
Hard-boiled egg: Its yolk is mashed with oil to form a creamy base that binds the salad.
Salad oil: Adds fat and smoothness, carrying the seasonings through the egg paste.
Onion vinegar: Adds acidity and sharpness that brightens the rich cheese and egg.
Cayenne pepper: Adds heat that gives the salad its crab-like bite.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cheese, egg, pepper, sugar, mustard, vinegar):

Capsicumfits better
Horseradishfits better
Lettucefits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, egg, pepper, sugar, mustard, vinegar. 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.