Name: Oyster and Celery Salad
Ingredients: 12 oysters; 2 heads of celery; mayonnaise dressing; caviar for garnish

Why it works: Oyster and caviar work together. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Oyster and Celery Salad

Ingredients

12 oysters
2 heads of celery
mayonnaise dressing
caviar for garnish

Directions

Prepare

Chop the oysters into small dice.
Finely shred the white part of the celery.

Dress and assemble

Toss the oysters and celery in mayonnaise dressing.
Place the mixture in a glass dish.
Cover thoroughly with more mayonnaise.

Garnish and serve

Garnish with celery tufts and small heaps of caviar 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.

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.

Oyster + caviartop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together16 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Oyster + celerytop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,131 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Celery + caviartop 32% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together11 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Oysters: Provide the main savoury body and briny flavour of the salad.
Celery: Adds crisp texture and a fresh, mildly bitter crunch that contrasts the soft oysters.
Mayonnaise dressing: Adds fat and moisture, binding the oysters and celery and coating them richly.