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Salad

Asparagus and Egg Salad

A salad of cooked asparagus and hard‑boiled eggs topped with mayonnaise and grated cheese.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Asparagus and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 313 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Asparagus and Egg Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cook, drain, and chill the asparagus whole.

  2. Hard-boil the eggs for about 10 minutes, then cut them lengthwise into quarters.

Assemble and serve

  1. Arrange the asparagus on a bed of lettuce and surround it with the egg quarters.

  2. Add spoonfuls of stiff mayonnaise around the edge.

  3. Sprinkle grated cheese over the asparagus before serving.

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. Asparagus + lettucetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together313 recipes

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

  2. Asparagus + cheesetop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together219 recipes

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

  3. Asparagus + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,338 recipes

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

  4. Lettuce + cheesetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together614 recipes

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

  5. Egg + cheesetop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,253 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

Asparagus
Forms the main body of the salad and provides its fresh, crisp-tender texture.
Hard-boiled eggs
Add protein-rich bulk and a soft, creamy texture against the crisp vegetables.
Stiff mayonnaise
Adds fat and richness, binding the flavors and giving a creamy finish.
Grated cheese
Adds salty, savory flavor that contrasts with the mild asparagus and eggs.

The step that matters

Hard-boil the eggs for about 10 minutes. Cooking eggs too long causes a green-gray ring around the yolk and a rubbery white, while too little time leaves the yolk runny and hard to quarter cleanly. Timing sets a firm but tender yolk.

Swap the lettuce

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (asparagus, egg, cheese):

  1. Spinachfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Mustardfits better
  4. Lettucethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against asparagus, egg, cheese. 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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