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Salad

Indian Salad

A salad of nasturtium leaves, apple, cucumber, and a mayonnaise-tamarind dressing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Lime and tamarind match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 133 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Indian Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Pick the leaves and flowers of the giant nasturtium plant, steep them in cold water, and drain on a napkin.

  2. Cut the leaves into small pieces and add the apple slices and cucumber. Mix well and place in a salad bowl.

Garnish and serve

  1. Garnish with lime slices, mustard and cress, and crimson capsicum pods.

  2. Serve with mayonnaise sauce mixed with preserved tamarinds and chopped garlic or shallot.

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.

  1. Lime + tamarindtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together133 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  2. Lime + capsicumtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,969 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Cucumber + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,281 recipes

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

  4. Mustard + tamarindtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together149 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Cucumber + capsicumtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,633 recipes

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Leaves and flowers of giant nasturtium plant
Provides the peppery, fresh flavour and the main body of the salad.
Apple
Adds crisp texture and mild sweetness that balances the peppery leaves.
Cucumber
Adds cool, moist crunch to the salad.
Mayonnaise sauce
Adds richness and fat that softens the sharp, peppery flavour of the leaves.
Preserved tamarinds
Adds tart, acidic flavour to the dressing.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, lime, mustard, capsicum, sauce, tamarind, clove):

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Mangofits better
  3. Coconutfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, lime, mustard, capsicum, sauce, tamarind, clove. 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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