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Dessert

Pineapple-cherry Salad

A chilled salad of pineapple, cherries, marshmallows, almonds, and a creamy egg yolk mayonnaise mixture.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and gelatin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,628 recipes. Both carry acetic acid, which smells sour, vinegar. The science ↓

Pineapple-cherry Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dressing

  1. In a bowl, combine egg yolks and oil; thin with lemon juice.

  2. Add mayonnaise, whipped cream, and beaten egg whites.

Add the gelatin

  1. Soak gelatin in cold water, then dissolve in boiling water.

  2. Once cooled but not congealed, blend gelatin with the mayonnaise mixture.

Fold and serve

  1. Fold in cherries, pineapple, marshmallows, and almonds.

  2. Serve immediately.

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. Cream + gelatintop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  2. Lemon + almondtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Pineapple + almondtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together428 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  4. Lemon + pineappletop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,964 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Cream + almondtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,130 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Emulsify the oil into the base, giving the dressing its smooth, rich body.
Mayonnaise
Adds fat and creaminess, keeping the salad moist and rich.
Heavy cream
Whipped to stiff peaks, it adds lightness and a soft, airy texture.
Egg whites
Beaten to stiff peaks, they add lift and a light, airy structure.
Gelatin
Sets the mixture so the salad holds its shape when chilled.
Marshmallows
Add sweetness and a soft, chewy texture among the fruit.

The step that matters

Blend the gelatin once it has cooled but not set. If the gelatin is still too hot, it can thin the mayonnaise and whipped cream and cause separation. If it has already begun to congeal, it forms lumps and won't mix evenly through the base.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, cream, gelatin, pineapple, almond):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Strawberryfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, cream, gelatin, pineapple, almond. 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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