Name: Celery and Sardine Salad
Ingredients: celery; salt; pepper; vinegar; sardines; mayonnaise dressing

Why it works: Celery and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Celery and Sardine Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Cut the celery into 1-inch lengths.
Season with salt, pepper, and vinegar.
Heap the seasoned celery on a dish.
Lay sardines on the base of the celery pile.
Pour mayonnaise dressing over the salad and 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.

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 + peppertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together16,012 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,814 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Celery + vinegartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,627 recipes

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