Why it works: Lettuce and walnut match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 491 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓
Prune Salad
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the prunes
Wash and soak the prunes for 3 hours.
Cook the prunes until tender, then cool and pit them.
Stuff the prunes with English walnuts.
Assemble and serve
Shred the lettuce and create a nest with it on a plate.
Place 3 or 4 stuffed prunes on the lettuce nest.
Cover with mayonnaise dressing and serve.
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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Lettuce + walnuttop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together491 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
- Prunes
- Provide the main body of the salad, with a soft, chewy texture and sweetness once cooked.
- Lettuce
- Forms a crisp, fresh bed that holds the stuffed prunes and adds contrast in texture.
- English walnuts
- Add a crunchy texture and nutty flavour inside the stuffed prunes.
- Mayonnaise dressing
- Adds richness and creaminess, and moisture to the salad.
The step that matters
Cook the prunes until tender. Prunes must be cooked fully after soaking so they soften enough to pit and stuff without tearing. Undercooked prunes stay firm and can split or resist the filling.
“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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