Skip to main content
Salad

Salmon Salad

A salad of canned salmon, cabbage, pickles, hard‑boiled eggs, and a vinegar dressing.

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

Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Salmon Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Remove the bone and skin from the can of salmon and mince it very fine.

  2. In a bowl, combine the minced salmon, chopped cabbage, chopped pickles, and chopped hard-boiled eggs.

Dress and serve

  1. In a separate bowl, mix the boiling vinegar with salt, pepper, sugar, and mustard to taste.

  2. Pour the vinegar mixture over the salmon and cabbage mixture and stir to combine.

  3. Garnish the dish with curled parsley or lettuce leaves before serving.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  4. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Mustard + parsleytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,588 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

Salmon
Provides the main protein and flesh that forms the body of the salad.
Cabbage
Adds crisp texture and bulk that holds up against the dressing.
Hard-boiled eggs
Add richness and a soft, creamy texture to the mixture.
Pickles
Add acidity and a tangy bite that brightens the salad.
Boiling vinegar
Adds sharp acidity and moisture that softens the cabbage and seasons the salad.

The step that matters

Pouring the boiling vinegar mixture. Boiling vinegar can wilt the cabbage and cook the salmon slightly if poured too early or too hot. Mix it in promptly so the seasoning is evenly distributed without overcooking the delicate fish.

Swap the cabbage

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, egg, vinegar, pepper, sugar, mustard, parsley. 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 salmon salad recipes

Dressing 4Jellied 3 See all 153 →

You might also like

Cabbage DressingCabbage Dressing9 recipesChicken SaladChicken Salad623 recipesSalad DressingSalad Dressing491 recipesTomato SaladTomato Salad179 recipes