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Salad

Poinsetta Salad

A tomato-based salad with olives, walnuts, cucumbers, mayonnaise, served on lettuce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cucumber and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,409 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Poinsetta Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tomatoes

  1. Chill the tomatoes.

  2. With a sharp knife, cut down one inch from the bottom of each tomato, just through the skin, and turn the sections back like rose petals.

  3. Insert the knife again at the end of the tomato, cut in one-fourth inch, and turn back each section of flesh to form a second petal.

Fill and serve

  1. Cut out the center of the tomato and fill the cavity with the chopped olives, walnuts, cucumbers, and mayonnaise dressing.

  2. Drop a spoonful of mayonnaise on top, place on lettuce leaves, and serve.

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.

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. Cucumber + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,409 recipes

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

  2. Tomato + olivetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,539 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Walnut + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together491 recipes

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

  4. Tomato + cucumbertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,405 recipes

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

  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

Tomatoes
Form the edible cups and provide the juicy base that holds the filling.
Mayonnaise dressing
Adds fat and creaminess that binds the filling and moistens the crunchy chopped ingredients.
Walnuts
Add crunch and a rich, slightly bitter flavor that contrasts the soft tomato.

The step that matters

Cutting the petals. Cutting through only the skin and then turning the sections back keeps the petals attached at the base. Cutting too deep tears the flesh apart, so the tomato will not hold its rose shape or the filling.

Swap the walnut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, olive, cucumber, lettuce):

  1. Chickpeafits better
  2. Beansfits better
  3. Lentilsfits better
  4. Walnutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, olive, cucumber, lettuce. 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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