Name: Salmon Salad
Ingredients: 1 can salmon; 6 stalks celery; 1 can peas; 6 hard-boiled eggs; mayonnaise; lettuce leaves; wafers; potato chips

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 ↓

Salmon Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Flake the salmon and remove skin and bones.
Wash and drain the celery, then chop finely.
Dice the hard-boiled eggs.

Assemble and serve

Moisten the mixture with mayonnaise.
Serve on lettuce leaves with wafers and potato chips.

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.

Celery + lettucetop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,033 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Peas + lettucetop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,293 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
Salmon + peastop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together375 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Celery + peastop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,832 recipes

Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).
Salmon + eggtop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,485 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Salmon: Provides the main protein and flaky texture of the salad.
Hard-boiled eggs: Add body and a soft, creamy texture to the mixture.
Celery: Adds crisp texture and a fresh, mild crunch.
Mayonnaise: Adds fat and moisture that bind the salad together.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, peas, egg, lettuce, potato chip):

Capersfits better
Dillfits better
Tarragonfits better
Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, peas, egg, lettuce, potato chip. 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.