Skip to main content
Salad

Grouse Salad

A salad of greens topped with shredded grouse, hard‑boiled eggs, and a dressing of butter, oil, vinegar, and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Shallot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,737 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Grouse Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil the eggs until hard, then peel and chop them.

  2. Melt the butter in a pan and cook the grouse until done, then shred the meat.

Make the dressing

  1. In a bowl, combine shallot, sugar, egg yolk, parsley, and salt.

  2. Whisk in the oil and chili vinegar, then fold in the cream.

Assemble

  1. Toss the salad greens with the dressing, then top with the grouse and chopped eggs.

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. Shallot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

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

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Shallot + vinegartop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,374 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Chopped hard-boiled eggs add richness and body to the salad topping.
Egg yolk
Emulsifies the oil and vinegar so the dressing stays smooth and cohesive.
Cream
Adds moisture and a silky texture that softens the sharpness of the vinegar.
Oil
Provides fat that carries flavour and gives the dressing its body.
Chili vinegar
Adds acidity and heat that brighten the rich dressing.
Grouse
Supplies the main protein and savoury, meaty flavour of the dish.

The step that matters

Whisking in the oil and vinegar. Oil must be added gradually to the egg yolk while whisking so it emulsifies; adding it too fast can split the dressing into separate oil and liquid layers.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, butter, shallot, sugar, vinegar, cream):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, butter, shallot, sugar, vinegar, cream. 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.

You might also like

Chicken SaladChicken Salad623 recipesSalad DressingSalad Dressing491 recipesTomato SaladTomato Salad179 recipesCold SlawCold Slaw160 recipes