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Chicken Salad with Mayonnaise Sauce

A salad of boiled chicken, celery, lettuce, and a dressing of olive oil, vinegar, mustard, Worcestershire sauce, and eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Margaret Brown · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 21 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,356 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Chicken Salad with Mayonnaise Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken and vegetables

  1. Boil one pair of chickens until done.

  2. Let the chickens cool, skin them, and cut into small dice.

  3. Cut 2 dozen stalks of celery into small pieces.

  4. Cut 4 white heads of lettuce into medium-sized pieces.

  5. Cut one of the white heads of lettuce with the celery and chicken.

Make the dressing and mix

  1. Combine a teacupful of olive oil, 1/4 teacupful of vinegar, a light half teaspoonful of red pepper, salt to taste, 1 teaspoonful of mustard, and 1 tablespoonful of Worcestershire sauce; mix all together with the chicken and celery and let the celery be dry.

Make the mayonnaise

  1. Boil a medium-sized potato until done, then squeeze it through a fine sieve.

  2. Add to the potato a teaspoonful of mustard, cayenne pepper to taste, 2 yolks of raw eggs, and 2 boiled eggs mashed very fine.

  3. Beat the potatoes and eggs together, add half teacupful of vinegar a little at a time, and the contents of 3 half pints of olive oil; work the mixture until it becomes perfectly stiff and light.

  4. Refrigerate the mixture for 1 hour until cold.

Assemble and garnish

  1. Arrange the salad on a dish and pour the olive oil dressing over the top as an icing.

  2. Boil red beets and carrots, cut them into diamonds, roses, etc., and garnish the salad with them and sprigs of parsley.

  3. Take the remaining three heads of lettuce, cut into four quarters, place one quarter in the center of the salad, and arrange the others around the dish with parsley.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

408Calories
40 gProtein
24 gFat
8 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 12 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Chicken100g cooked165
Olive Oil1 tbsp (14g)119
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Soy Sauce1 tbsp (15ml)9
Chili1 tsp (2.7g)8
Celery1 stalk (40g)6
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Cayenne1 tsp (1.8g)6
Lettuce1 cup shredded (36g)5
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 Margaret Brown. 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. Mustard + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,356 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Lettuce + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,033 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

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

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

  5. Olive + lettucetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,580 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Provides the main body and protein of the salad.
Egg yolks
Emulsify the oil and vinegar into a stiff, creamy mayonnaise.
Olive oil
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavour and giving the dressing body.
Potato (in the method)
Adds starch and body, helping the mayonnaise hold a stiff, light texture.
Celery
Adds crisp texture and a fresh, mild crunch to the salad.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavour and helps balance the richness of the oil.

The step that matters

Adding the oil and vinegar to the yolk and potato mixture. Oil must be added slowly while beating so the egg yolks can emulsify it. Adding it too fast can break the mixture, leaving it oily and loose rather than stiff and light.

Swap the celery

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

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, mustard, olive, lettuce, chicken, vinegar, sauce. 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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