Name: Horitaki Greek Salad
Ingredients: 4 tomatoes sliced in segments; 1 large red onion sliced; ½ sliced cucumber; 2 tablespoons olive oil; ¼ cup feta cheese; ½ teaspoon salt; ½ teaspoon oregano; 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Why it works: Tomato and olive match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and 14,164 recipes mention both. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

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

Directions

Combine all ingredients except olive oil and toss gently.
Spread olive oil over all and sprinkle with salt, pepper and oregano.

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.

Tomato + olivetop 1% of all pairs

Aroma overlapstrong

Mentioned together14,164 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Tomato + oreganotop 2% of all pairs

Aroma overlapstrong

Mentioned together2,767 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Olive + feta cheesetop 2% of all pairs

Aroma overlapstrong

Mentioned together1,438 recipes

Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (apple, fatty).
Tomato + cucumbertop 3% of all pairs

Aroma overlapstrong

Mentioned together2,402 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Oregano + peppertop 3% of all pairs

Aroma overlapstrong

Mentioned together3,449 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes: Provide juiciness and the main body of the salad.
Red onion: Adds sharp, pungent flavour that mellows somewhat with resting.
Cucumber: Adds cool, crisp texture and moisture.
Olive oil: Adds fat and richness, carrying the flavour of the seasonings.
Feta cheese: Adds salty, tangy flavour and crumbly texture.

Flavor stand-ins for the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, cucumber, olive, feta cheese, oregano, pepper):

Capsicumbetter flavor fit
Eggplantbetter flavor fit
Spinachbetter flavor fit
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, cucumber, olive, feta cheese, oregano, 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).

“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.