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Salad

Jellied Apple Salad

A chilled salad of apples, celery, figs, and gelatin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,467 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Jellied Apple Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit

  1. Mix diced apples, sugar, diced celery, lemon juice, chopped figs, and salt in a bowl.

Make the gelatin

  1. Soften gelatin in cold water.

  2. Dissolve the softened gelatin in boiling water.

  3. Combine the gelatin mixture with the apple mixture.

Set and serve

  1. Pour the mixture into a mold.

  2. Refrigerate until congealed.

  3. Serve with mayonnaise.

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 + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,467 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Apple + figtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together238 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Sugar + gelatintop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,778 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Apple + celerytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,155 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).

  5. Lemon + figtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together763 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

What each ingredient does

Gelatin
Sets the liquid into a firm, sliceable salad that holds its shape when unmolded.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the sweet fruit and balances the sugar.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that offsets the tartness of the lemon juice and apples.
Apples
Provide the main fruit body, texture and fresh flavour in the set salad.
Figs
Add chewy texture and natural sweetness to the fruit mixture.

The step that matters

Combine the gelatin mixture with the apple mixture. Gelatin must be fully dissolved before it is mixed in, or it will form lumps and set unevenly. The mixture should also be cool but still fluid so it sets evenly without the fruit floating or separating.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (apple, sugar, lemon, fig, gelatin):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Gingerfits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against apple, sugar, lemon, fig, gelatin. 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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