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Salad

A Bacon Salad

A salad of greens topped with small pieces of fried bacon, vinegar, pepper and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Charles Elme Francatelli · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,067 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

A Bacon Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Prepare any salad you have, such as endive, corn salad, lettuce, celery, mustard and cress, seasoned with beetroot, onions or shallot, and cut it up into a bowl.

  2. Cut eight ounces of fat bacon into small square pieces the size of a cob-nut.

Cook and dress

  1. Fry the bacon in a frying pan.

  2. As soon as the bacon is done, pour the whole upon the salad.

  3. Add two tablespoonfuls of vinegar, pepper and salt to taste.

  4. Mix thoroughly.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

55Calories
3 gProtein
4 gFat
2 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Bacon1 slice cooked (8g)43
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Vinegar1 tbsp (15ml) distilled3
Mustard1 tsp (5g) yellow3
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 Charles Elme Francatelli. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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.

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. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  3. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Fat bacon
Rendered fat from the frying bacon coats the salad leaves and adds rich, savoury flavour.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the salad and balances the richness of the bacon fat.

The step that matters

Pour the bacon over the salad as soon as it is done. Hot bacon fat wilts the leaves slightly and carries flavour into them. If the bacon cools first, the fat sets and the salad stays limp and greasy.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardthe original
  3. Cabbagefits about as well
  4. Cucumberfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, 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.

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