Name: Chicken Salad
Ingredients: cold boiled or roast chicken, cut into 1-inch cubes; celery, washed, scraped, and cut into small pieces; mayonnaise or boiled dressing; lettuce leaves; hard-boiled egg whites, cut in fancy shapes; hard-boiled egg yolks, forced through a strainer; gherkins, cut into thin slices (optional)

Why it works: Celery and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,033 recipes. Both carry nonanal, which smells fat, citrus. The science ↓

Chicken Salad

Ingredients

cold boiled or roast chicken, cut into 1-inch cubes
celery, washed, scraped, and cut into small pieces
mayonnaise or boiled dressing
lettuce leaves
hard-boiled egg whites, cut in fancy shapes
hard-boiled egg yolks, forced through a strainer
gherkins, cut into thin slices (optional)

Directions

Cut the cold chicken into 1-inch cubes.
Wash, scrape, and cut the celery into small pieces, then soak in ice water to crisp.
Drain and dry the celery on a towel.
Combine the chicken and celery in a bowl, using half as much celery as chicken.
Moisten the mixture with mayonnaise or boiled dressing.
Serve on lettuce leaves and garnish with egg whites and yolks or sliced gherkins.

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.

Celery + lettucetop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,033 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Chicken + celerytop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,375 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Chicken + lettucetop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,421 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Chicken + eggtop 30% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,991 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
Lettuce + eggtop 30% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,301 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).