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Mandarin Orange Salad

"This light salad with butter lettuce, sweet onion, oranges and mushrooms includes its own creamy garlic dressing recipe."

By allrecipes · From Open Recipes · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and mandarin orange share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and 38 recipes mention both. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓

The recipe

4 to 6 servings
Prep15 min

Ingredients

Contains: egg, milk, soy, fish (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Method written by CompKitchen from the ingredient list. Not the original author's method, not kitchen-tested.

  1. In a small bowl, whisk together the sour cream, mayonnaise, milk, minced garlic, Worcestershire sauce, white sugar, ground white pepper, and ground cayenne pepper until smooth.

  2. Season the dressing with salt and pepper to taste, then refrigerate while you prepare the salad.

  3. Rinse the butter lettuce, tear it into bite-sized pieces, and dry well. Place in a large salad bowl.

  4. Thinly slice the sweet onion and add it to the bowl. Add the sliced fresh mushrooms.

  5. Drain the mandarin oranges well and scatter them over the salad.

  6. Just before serving, pour the chilled dressing over the salad and toss gently until everything is evenly coated. Serve right away.

By allrecipes. Recipe from Open Recipes.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Milk + mandarin orangetop 10% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together38 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  2. Milk + buttertop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together81,222 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Cream + buttertop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together41,494 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + mandarin orangetop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together49 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Garlic + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together27,044 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

Flavor stand-ins for the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, milk, garlic, sauce, sugar, pepper, butter):

  1. Cinnamonbetter flavor fit
  2. Gingerbetter flavor fit
  3. Nutmegbetter flavor fit
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, milk, garlic, sauce, sugar, pepper, butter. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).