Skip to main content
Salad

Chickeni Salad

A salad of shredded chicken, celery, and a creamy mustard dressing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Chickeni Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dressing

  1. In a large pot, combine the egg yolks, sugar, salt, mustard, cayenne pepper, sweet cream, and vinegar.

  2. Boil the mixture over medium heat, stirring constantly until thickened.

Combine and serve

  1. Pour the hot mixture over the shredded chicken and chopped celery, and mix well.

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

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

  3. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, 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 as they set when heated, giving it a creamy body.
Sweet cream
Adds richness and smoothness to the dressing, softening its sharpness.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the richness.
Prepared mustard
Adds sharp flavor and helps emulsify the dressing.
Celery
Adds crisp texture and a fresh, mildly savory crunch to the salad.

The step that matters

Boil the dressing until thickened. Egg yolks thicken as they heat, but if they get too hot they can scramble into lumps. Stirring constantly keeps heat even so the dressing stays smooth.

Swap the celery

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

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Garlicfits about as well
  3. Celerythe original
  4. Capersfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, egg, sugar, mustard, pepper, cream, vinegar. 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.

More chicken salad recipes

Dressing 31Sandwich 8with Mayonnaise 6Cream Cheese 5Moulded 5Chinese 4 See all 638 →

You might also like

Salad DressingSalad Dressing491 recipesTomato SaladTomato Salad179 recipesCold SlawCold Slaw160 recipesBoiled Salad DressingBoiled Salad Dressing67 recipes