Why it works: Celery and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,033 recipes. Both carry nonanal, which smells fat, citrus. The science ↓
Pineapple Salad
Ingredients
Directions
Dice the pineapple and finely chop the celery.
Whip the cream and egg into the mayonnaise.
Mix part of the mayonnaise with the pineapple and celery.
Place the mixture on lettuce leaves.
Top with remaining mayonnaise and garnish with celery tips.
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.
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Celery + lettucetop 4% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together2,033 recipes
Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
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Pineapple + lettucetop 10% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together271 recipes
Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
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Pineapple + celerytop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together230 recipes
Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).
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Celery + creamtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,863 recipes
Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).
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Cream + eggtop 24% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together42,166 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Cream and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Swap the pineapple
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (celery, cream, egg, lettuce):
- Avocadofits better
- Lemonfits better
- Limefits better
- Pineapplethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against celery, cream, egg, lettuce. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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