Name: Russian Salad
Ingredients: cold potatoes, cut into ½ inch cubes; celery; whites of hard boiled eggs; pecans; cream dressing; lettuce; yolks of hard boiled eggs, riced

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 ↓

Russian Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Make the salad

Combine equal quantities of cold potatoes, celery, egg whites, and pecans, then mix with cream dressing.
Serve on a bed of lettuce.

Garnish and serve

Garnish with riced egg yolks on top.

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).
Potato + celerytop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,047 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Potato + lettucetop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together322 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
Pecans + lettucetop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together145 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Potato + pecanstop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together159 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Cold potatoes: Provide the bulk of the salad, holding their shape when cut into cubes.
Cream dressing: Adds moisture and richness that coats the salad and carries its flavor.
Hard boiled eggs: Whites add mild body and yolks, riced, give a soft, creamy garnish.
Celery: Adds crisp texture that contrasts with the soft potatoes and dressing.
Pecans: Add crunch and a toasty, nutty flavor to the salad.

Swap the pecans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, celery, egg, cream, lettuce):

Beansfits better
Walnutfits better
Chestnutfits better
Pecansthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, celery, egg, cream, 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.