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Salad

Gekman Salad

A salad of boiled potatoes, boiled red beets, raw onion, celery, apples, and herring dressed with vinegar, pepper, oil, mustard, and garnished with lettuce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Gekman Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the boiled potatoes, boiled red beets, raw onion, celery, apples, and salt salmon or herring.

Assemble and serve

  1. In a bowl, combine the chopped ingredients.

  2. Dress the salad with vinegar, pepper, oil, and mustard.

  3. Garnish the dish with lettuce leaves.

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. Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  3. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

  5. Potato + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Form the bulk of the salad and hold the other chopped ingredients together.
Red beets
Add color and an earthy sweetness to the salad.
Apples
Add crisp texture and a mild sweet-tart note.
Salt salmon or herring
Adds a salty, savory flavor that contrasts with the sweet vegetables.
Mustard
Adds sharp, pungent flavor that cuts through the richness of the oil.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, onion, celery, salmon, vinegar, pepper, mustard):

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Limefits better
  3. Lemonfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, onion, celery, salmon, vinegar, pepper, mustard. 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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