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Salad

Corn Salad

A salad of corn, cabbage, peppers, mustard, sugar, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,645 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Corn Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the cabbage, add salt, and let it stand to drain.

  2. Chop the peppers.

  3. Cut the corn off the cobs.

  4. Stir the mustard into a little vinegar.

Mix and seal

  1. Mix all ingredients together.

  2. Bring to a boil.

  3. Seal in cans or bottles.

  4. If the vinegar is very sour, dilute it with a little 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. Cabbage + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,645 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,324 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Cabbage
Provides the crunchy bulk, and salting it draws out water so the salad stays firm.
Corn
Adds sweet flavor and tender-crisp texture to the salad.
Sugar
Sweetens the brine and balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Vinegar
Supplies acidity that gives the salad its tang and helps preserve it.
Ground mustard
Contributes sharp, pungent flavor to the brine.
Peppers
Add fresh, sharp flavor and a little bite to the mix.

The step that matters

Let the salted cabbage drain. Salt draws water out of the cabbage. If it is not allowed to stand and drain, that extra liquid dilutes the vinegar brine and leaves the finished salad watery and less crisp.

Swap the cabbage

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Horseradishfits better
  3. Lettucefits about as well
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against corn, sugar, pepper, 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.

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