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Potato Salad

A salad of boiled potatoes, onions, radishes, walnuts, and a creamy mustard dressing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Radish and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 297 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Potato Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil the potatoes with their skins on until tender, then peel and dice them.

  2. In a bowl, combine the diced potatoes, grated onion, sliced radishes, and chopped walnuts.

Make the dressing

  1. In a separate bowl, beat the eggs and mix in the mustard, salt, sugar, black pepper, cayenne pepper, and cider vinegar.

  2. Cook the egg mixture in a double boiler until it thickens slightly, then cool it.

Assemble and serve

  1. Before serving, fold the whipped cream into the cooled dressing.

  2. Serve the potato salad on lettuce leaves, garnished with an olive.

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. Radish + mustardtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together297 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  3. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

  4. Potato + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,340 recipes

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

  5. Walnut + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together849 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Form the bulk of the salad and hold its shape once boiled and diced.
Eggs
Thicken the dressing when gently cooked, giving it a creamy body.
Cider vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the dressing and balances the richness.
Whipped cream
Folded into the cooled dressing to add lightness and a smooth, creamy texture.
Chopped english walnuts
Add crunch and a nutty flavor that contrasts with the soft potatoes.

The step that matters

Cooking the egg mixture in a double boiler. Eggs thicken from gentle heat, and if they get too hot they scramble. Cooking slowly over simmering water keeps the dressing smooth. Cool it fully before folding in the whipped cream so the cream does not deflate or melt.

Swap the walnut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, onion, radish, egg, mustard, sugar, pepper):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, onion, radish, egg, mustard, sugar, 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.

More potato salad recipes

German 31Hot 19Dressing 17Anchovy 15French 10American 9 See all 504 →

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