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Vegetable Nicoise Salad

Delicious spring salad loaded with flavor—tastes just like springtime!

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Why it works: Oregano and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and 791 recipes mention both. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

The recipe

Serves 6
Prep45 min
Cook15 min

Ingredients

Directions

Step-by-step directions aren't available for this recipe. See the full recipe at the source →

By tastykitchen. 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. Oregano + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together791 recipes

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

  2. Lemon + thymetop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together3,973 recipes

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

  3. Lemon + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together27,039 recipes

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

  4. Lemon + oreganotop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together784 recipes

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

  5. Olive + garlictop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together23,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

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

Flavor stand-ins for the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (olive, lemon, oregano, thyme, clove, garlic, pepper):

  1. Tomatobetter flavor fit
  2. Capsicumbetter flavor fit
  3. Carrotbetter flavor fit
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against olive, lemon, oregano, thyme, clove, garlic, pepper. 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).