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Salad

Mexican Salad

A fresh salad of tomatoes, green pepper, olives, and lettuce dressed with oil.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and olive are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,539 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Mexican Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Peel and slice the tomatoes.

  2. Seed and chop the green pepper.

Assemble and serve

  1. Arrange the tomatoes and green pepper on lettuce leaves in a salad bowl.

  2. Stone and slice the olives, then mix them with the salad.

  3. Serve with oil or dressing.

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. Tomato + olivetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,539 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

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

  3. Tomato + lettucetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,655 recipes

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

  4. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide juicy moisture and fresh, mildly acidic flavour to the salad.
Green pepper
Adds crisp texture and a fresh, slightly bitter vegetable note.
Olives
Contribute salty, briny flavour and a firm, meaty bite.

Swap the lettuce

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Eggplantfits better
  3. Spinachfits about as well
  4. Lettucethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, pepper, olive. 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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