Name: Cherry Salad
Ingredients: 1 cup sweet cherries, pitted; 1 cup sweet apples, diced; Crisp lettuce leaves; Whipped cream

Why it works: Apple and lettuce work together. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 515 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Cherry Salad

Ingredients

1 cup sweet cherries, pitted
1 cup sweet apples, diced
Crisp lettuce leaves
Whipped cream

Directions

Prepare

Pit the cherries and cut them into halves.
Dice the sweet apples into equal pieces.

Assemble and serve

Arrange the cherries and apples on crisp lettuce leaves.
Top with whipped cream and serve.

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.

Apple + lettucetop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together515 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
Lettuce + creamtop 26% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,121 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).
Apple + creamtop 27% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,089 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

What each ingredient does

Sweet cherries: Provide the main fruit flavor and juicy, sweet texture in the salad.
Sweet apples: Add crisp texture and mild sweetness that contrasts with the cherries.
Whipped cream: Adds richness and a light, creamy texture on top of the fruit.