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Salad

Apples and Nut Salad

A salad of chopped apples and celery dressed with a thickened egg yolk vinaigrette.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Apples and Nut Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the apples and celery together.

Make the dressing

  1. In a saucepan, combine egg yolks, vinegar, sugar, mustard, salt, and sour cream.

  2. Boil the mixture until thickened.

Serve

  1. Mix the dressing with the chopped apples and celery just before serving.

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. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

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

  5. Meat + mustardtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together855 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Thicken the dressing and add richness when cooked.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that balances the sweetness and richness of the dressing.
Sour cream
Adds creaminess and moisture to the dressing.
Apples
Provide crisp texture and fresh sweetness to the salad.

The step that matters

Boil the mixture until thickened. Egg yolks thicken as they heat, but if overheated they can curdle and turn grainy. Cook gently and stir while the dressing thickens.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (celery, meat, egg, vinegar, sugar, mustard, cream):

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Avocadofits better
  3. Cherryfits about as well
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against celery, meat, egg, vinegar, sugar, mustard, cream. 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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