Skip to main content
Main

Chicken Salad

A salad of boiled chicken, celery, and eggs dressed with raw egg yolks, olive oil, mustard, cayenne pepper, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Home for the Friendless (Chicago, Ill.) · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Chicken Salad

Why it works: Mustard and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Chicken Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Cut the breasts of four well boiled chickens into small pieces, not too fine. Mix the chicken pieces with eight teacups of celery cut in small pieces.

  2. Add the chopped whites of twelve hard boiled eggs.

Make the dressing

  1. Beat the yolks of four raw eggs with half an ordinary sized bottle of olive oil, beginning with a teaspoon and adding no more than that at a time until thoroughly mixed.

  2. Add the well mashed and pulverized yolks of twelve eggs, salt, pepper, three tablespoons mustard, a pinch of cayenne pepper, and a gill of vinegar.

Combine

  1. Stir this dressing thoroughly into the mixed chicken, celery, and egg whites.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

275Calories
39 gProtein
10 gFat
6 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 9 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Chicken100g cooked165
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Chili1 tsp (2.7g)8
Celery1 stalk (40g)6
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Cayenne1 tsp (1.8g)6
Mustard1 tsp (5g) yellow3
Vinegar1 tbsp (15ml) distilled3
Salt1 tsp (6g)0

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

By Home for the Friendless (Chicago, Ill.). Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures. See the original page.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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.

  1. Mustard + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  3. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Mustard + chickentop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,192 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Raw egg yolks
Emulsify with olive oil to form the thick, creamy base of the dressing.
Hard boiled egg whites
Add firm, mild texture and body to the salad.
Mashed egg yolks
Thicken the dressing and add richness and a smooth texture.
Mustard
Adds sharp flavour and helps stabilise the emulsified dressing.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the rich dressing and balances its fat.

The step that matters

Adding the oil to the raw yolks. Oil must be added very slowly, a teaspoon at a time, so the yolks can emulsify it. Adding it too fast makes the dressing split and separate instead of becoming thick and creamy.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mustard, pepper, vinegar, chicken, egg):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Dillfits better
  3. Capersfits about as well
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mustard, pepper, vinegar, chicken, egg. 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.

More chicken salad recipes

Dressing 31Sandwich 8with Mayonnaise 6Cream Cheese 5Moulded 5Chinese 4 See all 638 →

You might also like

Chicken BrothChicken Broth257 recipesChicken SoupChicken Soup156 recipesCream of Celery SoupCream of Celery Soup113 recipesCreamed ChickenCreamed Chicken89 recipes