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Salad

Pecan Salad

A cold salad of chopped pecans, olives, red pepper, and mayonnaise served on lettuce leaves.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Olive and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,580 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Pecan Salad

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a bowl, combine the chopped pecans, olives, and red pepper.

  2. Add mayonnaise dressing to the mixture and stir until well combined.

  3. Serve the salad cold on lettuce leaves or in pepper cases.

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

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

  2. Pepper + lettucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,037 recipes

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

  3. Pecans + olivetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together716 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Pecans + lettucetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together145 recipes

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

  5. Olive + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,263 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Pecans
Add crunch and a rich, nutty flavour that contrasts with the soft olives.
Olives
Add briny, salty flavour and a firm bite to the salad.
Red pepper
Adds crisp texture and mild sweetness to balance the richness of the dressing.
Mayonnaise dressing
Binds the ingredients together and adds moisture and richness.

Swap the pecans

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

  1. Chickpeafits better
  2. Black-eyed peafits better
  3. Lentilsfits better
  4. Pecansthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against olive, pepper, 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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