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Salad

Maple Chicken Salad

A salad of cubed chicken, celery, onions, cranberries, parsley, walnuts, and a maple-mustard dressing.

From the Recipes Wiki (Fandom) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Chicken and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and 17,808 recipes mention both. Both carry gamma-nonanolactone, which smells coconut, sweet. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

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

  • Dressing

Directions

Mix the salad

  1. Add the cooked cubed chicken, celery, onion, dried cranberries, parsley, and walnuts in a large mixing bowl.

  2. Stir to combine.

  3. In a smaller bowl, whisk together the dressing ingredients.

  4. Pour the dressing mixture over the chicken salad.

  5. Toss to thoroughly coat.

Chill and serve

  1. Cover and refrigerate a few hours before serving (may refrigerate up to 24 hours before serving).

  2. Line individual plates with red lettuce leaves.

  3. Spoon chicken salad onto lettuce leaves and serve.

Recipe from the Recipes Wiki (Fandom).

This recipe comes from the Recipes Wiki on Fandom and is licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Our formatting and summaries are shared under the same licence.

Steps grouped into stages for easier reading; the method is the source's own.

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. Chicken + oniontop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together17,808 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  2. Celery + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together6,805 recipes

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

  3. Walnut + lettucetop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together491 recipes

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

  4. Celery + lettucetop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together2,033 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  5. Celery + walnuttop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together851 recipes

    Shared aroma: sabinene (woody, terpenic).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken breasts and thigh pieces
Provide the cooked meat that forms the body of the salad.
Mayonnaise
Adds moisture and creaminess, binding the salad and coating the chicken.
Celery
Adds crisp texture that contrasts with the soft chicken.
Dried cranberries
Add chewy texture and concentrated sweetness that balances the savory chicken.
Walnuts
Add crunch and a toasted, nutty flavor.
Maple syrup
Adds sweetness and a distinctive maple aroma to the dressing.

Flavor stand-ins for the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, celery, onion, walnut, lettuce, maple syrup, honey):

  1. Gingerbetter flavor fit
  2. Thymebetter flavor fit
  3. Garlicbetter flavor fit
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, celery, onion, walnut, lettuce, maple syrup, honey. 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).

“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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