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Chicken Salad

A salad of tender chicken, egg whites, celery, cabbage, and a dressing of butter, sugar, mustard, vinegar, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Chicken Salad

Why it works: Celery and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Chicken Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken and vegetables

  1. Boil the chicken until tender.

  2. Chop the whites of the hard boiled eggs moderately fine.

  3. Cut the chicken into small pieces.

  4. Measure the chicken and add equal parts chopped celery and cabbage.

Make the dressing

  1. Mash the yolks of the eggs fine, then mix in the butter, sugar, mustard, salt, pepper, and vinegar gradually.

Assemble and serve

  1. Combine the chicken, egg whites, celery, and cabbage in a bowl.

  2. Pour the dressing over the mixture and garnish with lettuce leaves and stuffed olives.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Cabbage + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,645 recipes

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

  3. Celery + cabbagetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,840 recipes

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

  4. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Chicken + mustardtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,192 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Provides the main protein and bulk of the salad.
Hard boiled eggs
Egg whites add mild body and the mashed yolks enrich the dressing.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, creamy texture to the dressing.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the richness.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharpness of the vinegar and mustard.
Celery
Adds crisp texture and a fresh, mild flavor.

The step that matters

Mashing the yolks fine and adding the dressing gradually. Mashing the yolks finely lets them blend smoothly into the butter and vinegar, so the dressing becomes an even emulsion rather than lumpy. Adding the liquid vinegar slowly helps the fat and liquid combine without separating.

Swap the cabbage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, egg, celery, butter, sugar, mustard, vinegar):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, egg, celery, butter, sugar, mustard, vinegar. 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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