Name: Cold Slaw
Ingredients: 1 small cabbage, cut into small pieces; 1 cup vinegar; 2 teaspoons mustard; 1 teaspoon salt; 4 teaspoons sugar; 2 tablespoons melted butter; 2 tablespoons finely mashed potatoes (optional)

Why it works: Cabbage and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,645 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Cold Slaw

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Cut the cabbage into small pieces.

Make the dressing

In a bowl, mix the vinegar, mustard, salt, sugar, and melted butter.
Add the finely mashed potatoes to the dressing if desired.

Combine and serve

Pour the dressing over the cabbage and toss to combine.

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.

Cabbage + mustardtop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,645 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Mustard + potatotop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,340 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together14,067 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Cabbage + potatotop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together275 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Cabbage + vinegartop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,924 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

Cabbage: Forms the crisp, bulky base that the dressing coats.
Vinegar: Adds sharpness that balances the sugar and fat in the dressing.
Sugar: Adds sweetness that offsets the acidity of the vinegar.
Melted butter: Adds richness and a smooth, fatty mouthfeel to the dressing.
Mashed potatoes: Thickens the dressing slightly and adds body, if used.

Swap the potato

The recipe marks potato as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cabbage, vinegar, mustard, sugar, butter):

Horseradishfits better
Radishfits better
Broccolifits better
Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, vinegar, mustard, sugar, butter. 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.