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Salad

Cold Slaw

A cabbage slaw dressed with a custard-like egg, butter, sugar, vinegar, mustard, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Cold Slaw

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 the cabbage

  1. Cut the cabbage in half and place it in a dish.

  2. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

  3. Sprinkle mustard over the cabbage.

Make the dressing

  1. In a bowl, beat the eggs lightly.

  2. Add butter, sugar, and vinegar to the eggs.

  3. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until thickened like custard.

Combine and chill

  1. Pour the dressing over the cabbage and let it cool slightly.

  2. Mix lightly with a fork and refrigerate until ready to serve.

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.

  1. Cabbage + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,645 recipes

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

  2. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

  5. 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

Eggs
Thicken the cooked dressing into a custard-like sauce that coats the cabbage.
Butter
Adds richness and smoothness to the dressing.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the richness of the eggs and butter.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with a touch of sweetness.
Cabbage
Provides the crisp, bulky base of the slaw that the dressing coats.

The step that matters

Cook the dressing until thickened, stirring constantly. Egg proteins set as they heat, so the mixture can curdle or scramble if it gets too hot or is left unstirred. Constant stirring over medium heat keeps the heat even and the dressing smooth and custard-like.

Swap the cabbage

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

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, mustard, egg, butter, sugar, 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.

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