Name: Fruit Salad
Ingredients: 3 oranges, cut up and drained; 1 pint pineapple, canned or fresh, drained; 1 pound Malaga grapes, halved and seeds removed; 1 pound English walnuts, in shell; Fruit Salad dressing

Why it works: Pineapple and grape match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 709 recipes. Both carry 1-hexanal, which smells fruit. The science ↓

Fruit Salad

Ingredients

3 oranges, cut up and drained
1 pint pineapple, canned or fresh, drained
1 pound Malaga grapes, halved and seeds removed
1 pound English walnuts, in shell
Fruit Salad dressing

Directions

Prepare the fruit

Cut the oranges into pieces and drain them well in a sieve.
Drain the pineapple if using canned, or cut fresh pineapple into pieces.
Halve the Malaga grapes and remove the seeds.
Crack the shells of the English walnuts to use the nuts inside.

Assemble

Combine all the fruits and nuts in a bowl and toss with Fruit Salad dressing.

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.

Pineapple + grapetop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together709 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).
Orange + pineappletop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,664 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).
Orange + grapetop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,771 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Grape + walnuttop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,427 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).
Orange + walnuttop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,058 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Malaga grapes: Provide juicy sweetness and a firm, bite-sized texture in the salad.
English walnuts: Add crunch and a toasty, nutty flavor that contrasts with the soft fruit.
Oranges: Add bright acidity and juice that moistens the salad.
Pineapple: Adds tangy sweetness and extra juiciness to the fruit mix.