Name: Simple Ayurvedic Sprout Salad
Ingredients: 1 cup fresh mung bean sprouts (sprout your own and use them when the sprouts are about ½ inch long); ½ cup peeled, deseeded, diced cucumber; ½ cup chopped celery; 1 tbsp lemon juice; 1 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil; 1 tbsp chopped fresh cilantro; 1 tbsp sunflower seeds; Salt to taste; Black pepper to taste

Why it works: Lemon and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Simple Ayurvedic Sprout Salad

Ingredients

1 cup fresh mung bean sprouts (sprout your own and use them when the sprouts are about ½ inch long)
½ cup peeled, deseeded, diced cucumber
½ cup chopped celery
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1 tbsp chopped fresh cilantro
1 tbsp sunflower seeds
Salt to taste
Black pepper to taste

Directions

Combine the veggies and sprouts in a glass bowl.
Whisk together the salt, pepper, lemon juice, and olive oil in a separate bowl, then add to the salad and toss well to mix.
Garnish with the cilantro and sunflower seeds, and serve at room temperature or cool.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

325Calories

7 gProtein

28 gFat

17 gCarbs

Counts 8 of 9 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 8 portions

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Sunflower Seed	1 oz (28g) hulled	165
Olive Oil	1 tbsp (14g)	119
Cucumber	1/2 cup sliced (52g)	16
Lemon	juice of 1 lemon (48ml)	12
Celery	1 stalk (40g)	6
Black Pepper	1 tsp ground (2.3g)	6
Cilantro	1 tbsp chopped fresh (1g)	1
Salt	1 tsp (6g)	0
Mung Bean	not in our table	0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

Recipe from the Wikibooks Cookbook.

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 their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together27,047 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Celery + lemontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together3,467 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Mung bean + cucumbertop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together22 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together16,012 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Lemon + sunflowertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together352 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Mung bean sprouts: Provide the crisp, watery bulk that gives the salad its main texture.
Cucumber: Adds moisture and a cool, crisp crunch to the salad.
Celery: Adds firm crunch and a fresh, slightly salty vegetable flavor.
Lemon juice: Adds acidity that brightens the flavors and balances the olive oil.
Extra-virgin olive oil: Adds fat that carries flavor and gives the dressing body.

Swap the mung bean

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, celery, lemon, olive, sunflower, pepper):

Chickpeafits better
Walnutfits better
Cashew nutfits better
Mung beanthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, celery, lemon, olive, sunflower, pepper. 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.