Why it works: Peanut and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 170 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓
Banana Croquette Salad
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Peel the bananas and cut them crosswise.
Trim the ends to shape them like croquettes.
Coat and serve
Moisten the banana pieces with mayonnaise.
Roll the pieces in chopped peanuts.
Place each piece on a lettuce leaf.
Cover partially with mayonnaise or fruit salad dressing.
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.
-
Peanut + lettucetop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together170 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
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Banana + peanuttop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together308 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
-
Banana + lettucetop 11% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together198 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Ripe bananas
- Provide the main body of the salad, with soft sweet flesh that holds its shape when trimmed.
- Mayonnaise
- Adds fat and moisture, helping the peanut coating adhere and giving a creamy finish.
- Chopped peanuts
- Add crunch and a toasty, nutty flavor that contrasts with the soft banana.
Swap the banana
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (peanut, lettuce):
- Avocadofits better
- Limefits better
- Coconutfits better
- Bananathe original
Fit is the average pairing score against peanut, lettuce. 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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