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Almond Salad or Tartar Sauce

A salad made with blanched almonds, olives, chili peppers, cucumber pickles, sugar, salad dressing, and benzoate of soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Almond and olive match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,875 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Almond Salad or Tartar Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Blanch the almonds by dropping them in boiling water for about 10 minutes, then peel and chop them finely.

  2. Chop the cucumber pickles into cubes about the size of a small pea.

  3. Chop the red chili peppers and olives moderately fine, but do not grind them.

Mix and store

  1. Combine all ingredients in a large bowl and mix thoroughly.

  2. If not using benzoate of soda, store in hermetically sealed containers and sterilize.

  3. Process 1-pound glass jars for 30 minutes at 180°F (82°C), 2-pound jars for 45 minutes, No. 1 cans for 25 minutes, and No. 10 cans for 1 hour at 190°F (88°C).

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. Almond + olivetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Olive + cucumbertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

  3. Almond + cucumbertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together166 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Olive + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,263 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Pepper + cucumbertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,991 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

Blanched almonds
Provide the main crunchy texture and nutty body of the salad.
California ripe olives
Add fat, savory flavor, and a soft texture that balances the crunch.
Cucumber pickles
Contribute acidity and crisp texture through their brine and firm flesh.
Granulated sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the acidity of the pickles and dressing.
Salad dressing
Supplies moisture and tangy flavor that binds the chopped ingredients together.
Benzoate of soda
Acts as a preservative that inhibits spoilage microorganisms in the salad.

The step that matters

Process jars or cans for the stated time and temperature. Heat processing destroys spoilage microbes and seals in safety. Underprocessing can leave bacteria alive, while the container size sets how long heat must penetrate the dense mixture.

Swap the almond

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (olive, pepper, cucumber, sugar):

  1. Chickpeafits better
  2. Sesamefits better
  3. Beansfits better
  4. Almondthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against olive, pepper, cucumber, sugar. 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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